March 29, 2023

But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel… Luke 24:21a

Part 1

As Jesus walked “incognito” with the two travelers on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:15-17), He listened to the sadness in their conversation as they looked back over the recent events surrounding Passover. Along with the disciples, these followers of Jesus had listened to Him speak and set their hopes upon Him as the Messiah who was going to redeem Israel. To them, “redeem Israel” meant the ejection of the hated Romans.

Pagan Rome’s rise to power in 168BC was, in the big picture, fairly recent. Yet the Messianic expectations radically shifted over this relatively short period to a narrow and temporal meaning of redemption. These expectations revealed a desire for worldly power that progressed toward the creation of a treacherous entanglement of religion and politics. Religious leaders actually cooperated with their sworn enemies, the Romans, to have Jesus killed. The prophecies contained in Daniel show us that none of this was a surprise to God. Jesus had even verbalized ahead of time His upcoming crucifixion, but it was not received by His listeners.

For forty days following His resurrection, it is as if a sacred and very pregnant pause was placed on the entire plan of redemption in order to recalibrate expectations. And why did they need recalibrating? To line up with Scripture! Throughout His earthly ministry, Jesus constantly referred to the written word, what we now call the Old Testament. His own victories over Satan’s temptations began with, “It is written…!”—and as events were unfolding, Jesus highlighted them as fulfillments of the Scriptures, just as they had been predicted. And then, after His death and resurrection, He again turned the attention of His listeners to the written word. No doubt, He wanted them to see in Scripture itself His life, death, and resurrection – because this Word would remain right up to the end of this age – for the benefit of the billions and billions who are not eyewitnesses. Jesus, the living Word, knew that the eternal future of these generations to come depended upon it. So, we see that, long after His ascension into heaven, and long after all of the eyewitnesses have died, He has made certain that we have the Bible as a sure guide for all of life.

I must regularly ask myself: what in my thinking needs recalibrating in order to line up with God's word?

Even as He was about to be arrested by Roman soldiers, Jesus said:

“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 must happen thus?” In that hour Jesus said to the multitudes, “Have you come out, as against a robber, with swords and clubs to take Me? I sat daily with you, teaching in the temple, and you did not seize Me. But this was done that the Scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled.” Then all the disciples forsook Him and fled. Matthew 26:53-56