“Lord Jesus, please forgive us that we are insensitive and callous about our walk with You. We hesitate to give ourselves to You, completely. In Your name, we pray. Amen.”
Acts 3:14-16 But you denied the Holy One and the Just, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, (15) and killed the Prince of life, whom God raised from the dead, of which we are witnesses. (16) And His name, through faith in His name, has made this man strong, whom you see and know. Yes, the faith which comes through Him has given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all.
Jesus gave perfect soundness to the man who was born lame. The Lord is the one who gives us completeness. Colossians 2:9-10 For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; (10) and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.
Apostle Paul gives us a description of Jesus. Colossians 1:15-17 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. (16) For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. (17) And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
Jesus is the El-Shaddai. He is the Almighty God who is enough! He is more than sufficient to meet any need. He is power and provision. In great compassion, He sustains, nourishes, and protects. He takes our weaknesses and gives us strength.
The Lord had made Himself known to the Jews but they refused to acknowledge Him as the Messiah. Not knowing Jesus and choosing not to know Him, about whom the Jews had been taught from the Scriptures, they asked for Him to be crucified.
The Scriptures spoke of His Holy One and the Just. Zechariah 9:9 “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, Lowly and riding on a donkey, A colt, the foal of a donkey.
As He came into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey, the people recognized Him as the King of Israel.
John 12:12-15 The next day a great multitude that had come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, (13) took branches of palm trees and went out to meet Him, and cried out: “Hosanna! ‘BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD!’ The King of Israel!” (14) Then Jesus, when He had found a young donkey, sat on it; as it is written: (15) “FEAR NOT, DAUGHTER OF ZION; BEHOLD, YOUR KING IS COMING, SITTING ON A DONKEY’S COLT.”
Yet, they did not see Him as The Just One. This was an opportunity for the Jews to recognise Jesus, surrender, and submit to Him as their King.
When they saw Jesus being crucified and they knew that there was no sin in Him, did not the Jews connect Jesus with the Scriptures? Isaiah 53:11 He shall see the labour of His soul, and be satisfied. By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, For He shall bear their iniquities.
They could have repented before Jesus and surrendered to Him as their awaited Messiah. They did not.
After Jesus rose from the dead, they should have connected His resurrection to the Holy One, who did not see corruption. Psalms 16:10 For You will not leave my soul in Sheol, Nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption. Even then, there was the opportunity for them to repent and give their lives to Jesus. They did not.
The height of their wickedness was that the Jews asked for a murderer to be granted to them but they wanted Jesus to be crucified. It was like placing a seal of confirmation on the evil that was on display. There was no remorse for the evil that they were committing.
It was here, when the healing of the lame man had taken place, and Peter and John were bringing Jesus into focus as the Messiah, that the Jews were being confronted with their folly.
Isn’t it the same with us? We are not proactive to connect the events of our times with the Scriptures and see the truth of God, for our times and for His kingdom. We continue on with our self-obsessed lives. We seek God for our needs to be met. We need God to crash into our lives, ever so often, to be shaken out of our callousness and insensitivity and surrender to His lordship over us, for us to serve in His kingdom.
Consider the love of God for man. Why should He give any weightage to us? Could He not cast us all away as people of no worth to Him, people who are rebellious to our core? Yet, He has chosen to love us so that while we were still sinners, Jesus died for us. Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Will we as His church, learn from the folly of the Jews, but be fully committed to serving our King in His kingdom?