Some children (it seems) never say ‘I’m SORRY,’ after they do bad things to you. But I know that you do because you are a kind child of God.
Sound familiar? The parental leading or teacher’s prayer of repentance for your unkind words?
“Be kind to one another, BEFORE you must repent.”
A Lenten Short Take on Scripture
That’s NOT in the Bible, is it?
No, not in those exact words but this advice to the children of the Lord God resounds throughout the Bible.
Some of us have been thinking about Lent as a time we should pray for forgiveness for all of our shortcomings — sins of commission and omission — things we have said that we ought not to have said..
Sins of ours for which JESUS was NAILED TO THE CROSS!
Yet wouldn’t we do better to behave a Christ?
To act like JESUS in our relationships with others?
Kindness OR Repentance?
Be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.
What were your most recent unkind words for which you must repent?
If our hearts would only have heeded the wise words of Scripture prior to allowing our tongues spew out unkind darts toward another, then our repentance and I’m sorries would not have been so required this day.
When it is My desire,
I will discipline them..
Sow for yourselves, with a view to righteousness; Harvest in accordance with kindness. Break up your uncultivated ground, For it is time to seek the LORD Until He comes and rains righteousness on you.
Therefore because of the Jewish day of preparation, since the tomb was nearby they laid Jesus there.
Joseph rolled a large stone against the entrance of the tomb and went away.
“Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! – John 1:36
From the day the Son of Man is delivered into the world and laid in a manger the shadow of the Cross foretold Christ’s Sacrifice.
And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.. For of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace.
For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ.
Then Moses called for all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go and take for yourselves lambs according to your families, and slay the Passover lamb.
“As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up..
– John 3:13 NASB
The crowd then answered Him, “We have heard out of the Law that the Christ is to remain forever; and how can You say, ‘The Son of Man must be lifted up’?
Who is this Son of Man?”
John 12:34 NASB
By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of the blood, so that he who destroyed the firstborn would not touch them.
Now the body of the Son of Man lays lifeless and bloodied, partially wrapped in the shrouds of burial and entombed in darkness sealed away from the living by a guarded stone door.
“Listen, you heavens, and I will speak; And let the earth hear the words of my mouth! 2 May my teaching drip as the rain, My speech trickle as the dew, As droplets on the fresh grass, And as the showers on the vegetation. 3 For I proclaim the name of the Lord; Ascribe greatness to our God!
4 The Rock! His work is perfect, For all His ways are just; A God of faithfulness and without injustice, Righteous and just is He. 5 They have acted corruptly against Him, They are not His children, because of their defect; But are a perverse and crooked generation. 6 Is this what you do to the Lord, You foolish and unwise people? Is He not your Father who has purchased you? He has made you and established you.
“We have found Him of whom Moses in the Law and also the Prophets wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”
Gospel of John 1:45 NASB
The Pharisees had often come to Jesus before they crucified Him and now faithful men have laid their Messiah in a grave. Joseph, Nicodemus and a remnant of influential Jews believe and follow the Messiah secretly out of fear of their own lives.
“Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.
“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life.
“I do not receive glory from men; but I know you, that you do not have the love of God in yourselves…
The Pharisees had tested Jesus. Yet most continued to give glory to each other rather than the Messiah who came to teach truth in their midst.
Jesus preached the truth of Scripture to the Jews who claimed to be teachers.
“Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father;
the one who accuses you is Moses, in whom you have set your hope.
For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote about Me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?”
John 5: NASB
The Writings of Moshe
Deuteronomy 32: New American Standard Bible
.. And you drank wine of the blood of grapes..
18 You forgot the Rock who fathered you, And forgot the God who gave you birth.
19 “The Lord saw this, and spurned them Because of the provocation by His sons and daughters.
20 Then He said, ‘I will hide My face from them, I will see what their end will be; For they are a perverse generation, Sons in whom there is no faithfulness.
…
39 See now that I, I am He, And there is no god besides Me; It is I who put to death and give life. I have wounded and it is I who heal, And there is no one who can save anyone from My hand. 40 Indeed, I raise My hand to heaven, And say, as I live forever, 41 If I have sharpened My flashing sword, And My hand has taken hold of justice, I will return vengeance on My adversaries, And I will repay those who hate Me.
20 The LORD will send on you cursing, confusion, and rebuke, in all that you put your hand to do, until you are destroyed, and until you perish quickly; because of the evil of your doings, by which you have forsaken me.
33 The fruit of your ground, and all your labors, shall a nation which you don’t know eat up; and you shall be only oppressed and crushed always..
45-46 All these curses shall come on you, and shall pursue you, and overtake you, until you are destroyed; because you didn’t listen to the voice of the LORD your God, to keep his mitzvot and his statutes which he commanded you: and they shall be on you for a sign and for a wonder, and on your seed forever.
“I do not receive glory from men; but I know you, that you do not have the love of God in yourselves.
a resurrection of judgment…
“Do not marvel at this; for an hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice, and will come forth;
those who did the good deeds to a resurrection of life,
those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment.
The words of Jesus – John 5:28-29 NASB
As the crowds had approached Jerusalem for the seven-day celebration they laid palms before Jesus at the gates atop the holy hill.
Now as Jesus lay in the grave, His broken and bloodied Body partially prepared for burial, the public mourning of the faithful must wait for a sacred celebration of the final feast of pecach.
As Jesus lay on a slab of stone in a tomb sealed by a rock rolled before its entrance, faithful Jews knew well the curses of their own disobedience and separation from the Lord their God.
The Prophet Hosea (~755–710 B.C)
Hosea’s name means: salvation, as did that of Moses’ successor Joshua and as does that of the Son of Man known of Nazareth, Jesus.
After this day of irony in the festival feast would come the sorrowful day of mourning on the first day of the week.
Yet the words of Jesus before summoning Lazarus from the grave surly resounded in the hearts of their recent memory.
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die.
She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Messiah, God’s Son, he who comes into the world.” – John 11:27 Hebrew Names Version
The Silence of this Shabbat
There, as Jesus’ loved ones, family and followers mourned silently during the final feast of the Passover, the preparations of their hearts found no solace in His upcoming burial on the first day of the week.
For they had witnessedthe brutality of sin against the Sinless One on the Cross of Calvary.
The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into his hand. One who believes in the Son has eternal life,
but one who disobeys the Son won’t see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.”
the Good News of John 3:35-36 Hebrew Names Version
Death and Resurrection Hosea 13:4 I have been the Lord your God ever since the land of Egypt; you know no God but me, and no Savior exists besides me. 5 I knew you in the wilderness, in the land of drought.
“Moses didn’t give you bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. God’s bread is the man who comes from heaven and gives life to the world.”
Now after a considerable walk from somewhere beyond Judea, Jesus arrives in Bethany.
Jesus walks into a scene of death visited by mourners who loved Lazarus but also religious officials from Jerusalem who sought to accuse their Messiah of blasphemy for previous signs on the Sabbath.
As reminder of both heavy hearts and hard hearts in the crowds:
17 When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. Bethany was near Jerusalem (less than two miles away).
He arrives at the funeral of Lazarus. No talk of death and resurrection here, just wailing and mourning his loss.
19 Many Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them about their brother. When Martha heard that Yeshua was coming, she went to meet him.
“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask him.”
Lord God
Ἰησοῦν κύριε – Iēsous kyrios – Jesus Lord
Martha addresses their Messiah and friend.
“I know that God, theosin greek referring to any gods, but for Jews and followers of Christ (a Greek word for Messiah), Martha’s confidence in God includes a mysterious relationship between this Son of Man and the HOLY SPIRIT of the LORD God!
“God with” – ὁ – ho – with the Holy Spirit, the very breath of life which hovered over creation.
Jesus, God with us, frequently answered religious critics with personally relational replies like,
“God is spirit, and those G3588 who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
Now, out of compassion for a deceased friend and love for the family of Lazarus, the Messiah Jesus returns to Judea with nothing more to prove. (For the Lord had already raised others from death and healed some near to death of likely life-ending ailments to a cleansing of the flesh with life!)
Death and Resurrection
Death and resurrection always have connection. Will you rise again from the grave?
For Jesus’ friend Lazarus, temporary restoration of health and life in his case. Yet all understand judgment by the Lord God requires a raising of the spirit of your soul to life.
After flesh fails and bones decay to dust and ashes will the Lord also breathe life into a new body of each soul?
“..even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask him.”
23 Yeshua told Martha, “Your brother will come back to life.”
24 Martha answered Yeshua, “I know that he’ll come back to life on the last day, when everyone will come back to life.”
25 Yeshua said to her,
“I am the one who brings people back to life, and I am life itself. Those who believe in me will live even if they die. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.
The Messiah of God!
Do you believe that?”
Pause to think:
“I am life itself!” Those who believe in Jesus ( יְהוֹשׁוּעַ ) will live even though we die. The Lord God IS our Salvation!
27 Martha said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who was expected to come into the world.”
She has said this – that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God – with witnesses surrounding her home — Jews who believe and Jews looking for excuse to kill Jesus.
… she went away and called Mary her sister, saying secretly,
“The Teacher is here and is calling for you.”
When Mary heard this she sprang to her feet and went to him.
30 (Yeshua had not yet come into the village but was still where Martha had met him.) The Jews who were comforting Mary in the house saw her get up quickly and leave. So they followed her…
The Messiah approaching death and resurrection
Compelling drama! – with much expectation.
Those who loved this family and mourned the loss of Lazarus would not have expected Mary’s sudden joy.Rather, they followed her to continue their expected public mouring for the death of a fellow Jew.
Imagine their surprise at the scene about to unfold.
33 When Yeshua saw her crying, and the Jews who were crying with her, he was deeply moved and troubled.
34 So Yeshua asked, “Where did you put Lazarus?”
They answered him, “Lord, come and see.”
35 Yeshua cried.
36 The Jews said, “See how much Yeshua loved him.”
An appropriate witness of the true personal compassion of the Lord Jesus. Yet listen to the dissent of hardened hearts.
37 But some of the Jews asked, “Couldn’t this man who gave a blind man sight keep Lazarus from dying?”
Jesus hears our complaints and the Messiah hears our kind words. All those comments of the crowds did not matter to the Son of Man sent to this place to weep – sent here to suffer for our sins.
38 Deeply moved again, Yeshua went to the tomb.
It was a cave with a stone covering the entrance.
39 Yeshua said, “Take the stone away.”
To be continued...
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