NOVEMBER 25 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#32
“What! Could you not watch with Me one hour?” (Matthew 26:40)
LIVING FOR JESUS - Daily Prayer
JESUS, JESUS, JESUS - Praise to the Son that was Obedient to the
Father’s Will, the Only Begotten Son that Lived a Sinless Life, gave up
His Glory to become the Propitiation of our sins, that instead of
condemnation of death WHICH WE ALL DESERVE,
we could be RESURRECTED to new life because of HIS INFINITE MERCY!
O the Mystery of God that He loved the world so much that His
Plan of Salvation for the world which has rejected His Grace,
could receive His Mercy.
Truly Jesus is the Son of God and to all those that desire to be
made well, we can KNOW that we WILL be made well by
Believing in the DIVINE POWER
of the Name of the Only Begotten Son of God, even our LORD —
JESUS!!!
AMEN
THE JESUS QUESTIONS
Jesus has prayed three times in the Garden of Gethsemane where the
betrayal of our LORD into the hands of the chief priests was about to occur.
His DEATH was happening just as Jesus had told His disciples. Only two
days before the Passover Jesus had said:
“You know that after two days is the Passover,
and the Son of Man will be delivered up to be crucified.”
(Matthew 26:2)
and then when His Last Passover with His disciples began
Jesus told His disciples,
“Assuredly, I say to you, one of you will betray Me.” (Matthew 26:21).
Now Jesus and His disciples (with the exception of Judas Iscariot)
are in Gethsemane and Jesus awakes the sleeping disciples and announces,
“Rise, let us be going. See, My betrayer (Judas Iscariot) is at hand.”
(Matthew 26:46)
Matthew writes: “And while He was still speaking, behold, Judas,
one of the twelve, with a great multitude with swords and clubs,
came from the chief priests and elders of the people.” (Matthew 26:47)
Judas then gave Jesus a kiss as a sign of identifying Jesus and said,
“Greetings, Rabbi!” (Matthew 26:49)
Jesus replied to this greeting from Judas His betrayer,
“Friend, why have you come?” (Matthew 26:50).
Jesus of course knew the reason Judas had approached Him
in the darkness with a detail of armed guards but no one else knew
that this was all part of the Master Plan of Salvation and it should be noted
that even though Jesus KNEW that He was being betrayed by Judas
that Jesus still addressed Judas as “Friend”! Had this event caught Jesus
by surprise and had Jesus been mad at Judas then it would have been
a victory for evil and darkness but Jesus by His calm greeting of “Friend”
to Judas at this exact moment announced VICTORY for all that is GOOD
for the Plan of Salvation was going according to Plan
and even though this final Path for Jesus would lead to the Ultimate Sorrow
on the cross, Jesus KNEW that His Suffering would lead to the Ultimate Joy
and with
His Final Earthly Destination of the Cross, Death,
a Grave , and the Resurrection
clearly in view, Jesus called Judas “Friend”!!!
All Christians who profess Jesus as the Son of God and believes that
God so loved the world that He gave us GRACE
through the Sacrifice of His Only Begotten Son
that we should see the betrayal of God and His Son by the world as part
of the Path to God’s Glory! We should never seek to “judge others”
nor seek “revenge” for Jesus commanded us to “judge not”
and God has declared “vengeance is Mine” and
when we see Jesus fulfilling prophecy as He becomes
the Passover Lamb of God we should see VICTORY
over evil as the Ultimate Outcome
of any life lived in Obedience to the Father’s Will!
This Ultimate Confidence comes when Peter pulls his sword
in an effort to protect Jesus from His betrayers and Jesus says to Peter:
“Put your sword in its place, for all who take the sword
will perish by the sword. Or do you think that I cannot now pray
to My Father, and He will provide Me
with more than twelve legions of angels?
How then could the Scriptures be fulfilled, that it happen thus?”
(Matthew 26:52-54)
Jesus knew His “hour had come” and as always Jesus points
“the multitudes” to the Scriptures as He expresses the Ultimate
Confidence in the Scriptures to provide “Deliverance” when He
the explains why the betrayal and why the Sacrifice:
“But all this was done that the Scriptures
of the prophets might be fulfilled.”
(Matthew 26:56A)
However Matthew records what is still today our normally predictable
human response when evil raises its ugly head for immediately
after Jesus spoke those words Matthew wrote:
“Then all the disciples forsook Him and fled” (Matthew 26:56B) —
and we today when faced with great sorrow and great evil
we fail to listen to JESUS, but instead we forsake Him
and go the way of the world and we fail to “Watch and Pray” —
but that does not change the Plan of Salvation nor diminish the
VICTORY OF THE CROSS!!!
Our failure to pursue God in no way diminishes God,
His Glory, nor His Sovereignty —
our failure only makes us vulnerable to the attacks of evil
for our defenses are weakened because our Faith
has been abandoned and we expose ourselves to the lies of the world!
Our best defense against evil and the darkness is to
“Watch and Pray”
for God is
VICTORIOUS OVER THE WORLD!
