SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 5/8/2024 10:03 AM
My Worship Time Focus: “Intro to
Matthew 26:31-35”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew 26:31-35
Message of the verses: “31Then Jesus said
to them, "You will all fall away because of Me this night, for it is written, ‘I
WILL STRIKE DOWN THE SHEPHERD, AND THE SHEEP OF THE FLOCK SHALL BE SCATTERED.’ 32
"But after I have been raised, I will go ahead of you to Galilee." 33
But Peter said to Him, "Even though all may fall away because of
You, I will never fall away." 34 Jesus said to him, "Truly I say to
you that this very night, before a rooster crows, you will deny Me three
times." 35 Peter said to Him, "Even if I have to die with You, I will
not deny You." All the disciples said the same thing too.”
Once again I think it best to quote a paragraph from
MacArthur’s commentary as I begin this SD:
“Bu Matthew reveals how, in the purpose of God, the disciples’ failure
actually enhances and intensifies the grandeur of the Lord’s achievement. By way of contrast, their impotence served to
magnify His power, their unfaithfulness served to magnify His faithfulness, and
their dishonor served to magnify His majesty.”
It
seems to me that the Lord is reminding me of the truth that He is in control
even though from a human point of view there are times when it seems like He is
nowhere to be found. In my preparation
for this week’s Sunday school lesson from Zechariah 12 I am learning once again
that God is in control, in control of what will happen at the time just before
the Lord returns to planet earth when from what I have studied before that if
He did not come back at the time He comes back that the world would be
destroyed because of all the powerful weapons that man possesses. Make
no mistake about it God is in control and things will happen just like He
designed them to happen including having His Son go to the cross in order to
pay for the sins of the world.
We
have already looked at the first two elements of Jesus’ preparation for His
sacrificial death while He and His disciples were in the Upper Room. First was experiencing the final Passover
found in verses 17-25, and then establishing the Lord’s Supper found in verses
26-30. After his account of Jesus’
leaving Jerusalem and going to the Mount of Olives seen in verse 30, as He left
with eleven of His disciples, the ones who remained, Matthew presents this
third element: helping the impotent
disciples seen in verses 31-35.
It
was in this lesson found in verses 31-35 that Jesus taught His disciples, which
was a profound lesson for these men who despite their imminent display of
frailty, would become the principal human instruments in establishing His
church. This is something that only God
can do.
It
is in John’s gospel that we learn that after the Lord’s Supper Jesus gave the
eleven an extensive message that traditionally has been called the Upper Room
discourse which is seen in John 14-17.
In this discussion with His disciples Jesus’ teaching about believers’
being with Him in heaven and serving Him on earth the coming of the Holy
Spirit; the meaning of true peace, faithfulness, joy, love and fruitfulness;
the opposition believers can expect in the world; and His second coming. He concluded by offering a beautiful and
profound intercessory prayer on their behalf and in their presence. We know that this is only seen in the gospel
of John, but since it is there we can see where it fits in to where we are in
studying Matthew’s gospel, or in the other two gospels of Mark and Luke as they
go from the Upper Room to the Mount of Olives.
While
going to the Mount of Olives they would probably have run into people
celebrating the Passover, and we have already gone over that there were two
times when the Passover was celebrated.
“Before
they reached the garden, Jesus stopped and warned the disciples of their
forthcoming desertion. The teaching of
the Upper Room discourse had consisted largely of positive promises, but now it
was time for a negative message, a warning that the self-assured disciples
could not bring themselves to believe. We
witness a vivid demonstration both of Jesus’ omniscience and of the disciples’
ignorance.”
The
following are the names of the sections that we will be looking at as we move
through these verses, 31-35: “Jesus’
Omniscience” (31-32); “The Disciples’ Ignorance” (33-35).
5/8/2024 10:46 AM
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