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Jesus challenges us

Jesus challenges us

Jesus challenges us to focus on the main thing. God has a goal for us today. God wants us to focus on it.

It isn’t about what our next meal will be or what will be on the menu.

It is about doing what God wants us to do right now. Doing God’s will step by step, every day. All those steps add up to His grand plan for His world (the Kingdom).

Doing what God wants right now is our source of energy.

“My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.”  ~Jesus| The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. (2016). (John 4:34). Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles.

Jesus was not wrestling with God’s will or resisting God’s will. He was yielding Himself to God’s will. As perfect Man, He felt the awful burden of sin, and His holy soul was repelled by it. Yet as the Son of God, He knew that this was His mission in the world. The mystery of His humanity and deity is seen vividly in this scene.

Peter and his fellow disciples had promised to be faithful to death, and yet they went to sleep! They needed to pray for themselves, because danger was around the corner. And how much it would have meant to their Lord if they had watched and prayed with Him. They had failed, but their Lord had succeeded.

  • Is it costing me anything to be a disciple?
  • Will I be obedient?
  • Will I pay the price?

It is one of the paradoxes of the disciple’s  life that the more we give, the more we receive; the more we sacrifice, the more God blesses. Therefore the submissive mind leads to joy; it makes us more like the Messiah. This means sharing His joy as we also share in His sufferings. Of course, when love is the motive, sacrifice is never measured or mentioned. The person who constantly talks about his sacrifices does not have the submissive mind.

  • Matthew 26:39 — 39 And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will.”
  • Philippians 2:8 — 8 Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
  • Isaiah 50:5–6 — 5 The Master God has opened My ear; And I was not disobedient Nor did I turn back. 6 I gave My back to those who strike Me, And My cheeks to those who pluck out the beard; I did not cover My face from humiliation and spitting.
  • Isaiah 53:10–12 — 10 But the Master was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the Master will prosper in His hand. 11 As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities. 12 Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great, And He will divide the booty with the strong; Because He poured out Himself to death and was numbered with the transgressors; Yet He Himself bore the sin of many and interceded for the transgressors.
  • Matthew 16:21 — 21 From that time Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day.
  • John 10:18 — 18 “No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father.”
  • John 13:1 — 1 Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He would depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.
  • Hebrews 5:8 — 8 Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.