John 12:9-11…
The hardest thing in the world…
The Jewish hope for the Messiah was especially heightened during Passover, when the population of Jerusalem multiplied four to six times and people would be camping all around the area. Imagine the excitement when the people who had come learned that Jesus has recently raised a man from the dead. Lazarus was the living proof of His Messianic claims.
As a result, many Jews were leaving the religion of the Pharisees and going after Jesus. As word gets out that Jesus is near, a large crowd heads toward Bethany to meet Him. They also want to see Lazarus. But while Jesus inspires the messianic hopes of some, the chief priests, who had determined earlier that Jesus must die, now decide that Lazarus must die as well. The hatred aimed at Jesus boils over against Lazarus. One sin so quickly and so easily leads to another.
How can people be so blind? For the chief priests, it was because they cared less about the truth than they did their own positions and power, which Jesus threatens. This is what happens when people no longer pursue the will of God, self-denial, and settle for the will of man, self-preservation. When we find ourselves imagining harm to our brothers and sisters and also imagining that we are somehow justified in thinking it, we are in the wrong place.
The hard heart has no real peace. It refuses to be broken and so it must always look for other things to break. It is only when we learn to sacrifice our sacred pride that we pay the price of peace. God must bring us to that place, because the hardest thing in the world is the hardened heart. Only God can break that.
6 comments:
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Can God break a broken heart, a heart that really doesn't want to be broken? How can one be allowed to go on with a hardened heart and not have the wrath of God in his path? Were there is no love there is no peace in the heart, and since God is love, one does not have God in his heart. What would take God to break that heart, so love may spill from that heart so that may stop hurting others?
Hurt people, hurt people
"Love your brothers and sisters as I have loved you" Hurting is not from God!
That last paragraph was very insightful.
We spoke about this a coupe weeks ago. I like the way you Worded this.
"When we find ourselves imagining harm to our brothers and sisters and also imagining that we are somehow justified in thinking it, we are in the wrong place."
In response to the other Anonymous's, there must first be a repentant heart, (that is from God alone), (chosen by God),(directed by God) which is nothing we can do on our own, or of ourselves. A hardened heart cannot be changed by any other means than by God alone.
P.
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