Love

Sometimes, things we have done in the past come back to haunt us. That’s what happened to Jacob. Years earlier, Jacob had stolen his brother’s birthright and their father’s blessing. Now it was time for an accounting. Esau, Jacob’s twin brother, was coming to meet him.

On the Wednesday before the cross, Jesus told his disciples that he was going to be crucified. The religious leaders made plans to seize and kill him. And it was on Wednesday that Judas met with the High Priest and bargained for the sum of thirty silver pieces to betray Jesus. However, one encounter with Jesus stands out as an extravagant act of worship.

What does your relationship with God depend on? Things that you do? Things that you don’t do? Can you lose your relationship with God? Can you have a relationship with God and then do something that causes God to kick you out of his family?

What if God was not on your side? What if he didn’t have your back? What if he decided to take his eyes off you and look the other way? What if God said, “You are on your own!”

The disciples had just received very disturbing news. Jesus was going away, and where he was going, they could not come, at least for the time being.

Many people are confused about Jesus. Many people speak of him in different ways. In today’s passage, we are invited to a fresh start. We are asked to come and see for ourselves who Jesus really is.

I am writing this devo from a packed airplane. It was snowing, windy, and cold when we took off, but we’ll land in seventy-degree weather. After speaking at a church, I’ll get back on a plane and return to the cold. Life is a bit like my travels over the next couple of days. Some circumstances bring the blowing cold; others bring the warm sunshine.

It is one thing to ask, “Why?” when we go through the inevitable challenges of life. I would argue that the “Why?” question is a natural and normal response from a broken heart. We believe that some amount of explanation would help the pain subside, bring understanding to our exhausted reasoning, and allow us to gain a measure of joy in our circumstances. If we could see how our pain fits into God’s big picture, that would certainly go a long way in the healing process, wouldn’t it? But when we bring accusations against God, we are on a dangerous detour.

Our passage today is a front-row seat to a dialogue between God and Satan. In this conversation, initiated by God, we see the Father’s pride in his children and Satan’s hit at our motives.