I want to take a brief interlude from the Malachi Series to
post on Holy Week this week. First of all, how did Holy Week manage to creep up on me so
quickly?? Last time I checked it was just
Ash Wednesday, like, only a week ago. I feel like I’ve been in a time warp.
This concerns me–not because I’m afraid I have missed deadlines or anything,
but because I feel that it reflects on my relationship with God, and how I
prioritize it.
God says that He is to be first, always, all the time, every
time. But so often we just expect God
to understand why we have to make Him second, or third, or tenth, or…you get
it. God understands that we are busy right? I’m sure the Creator and Sustainer
of the Universe knows what it’s like to have His hands full, but we deceive ourselves
if we truly think this is an okay attitude to have.
If God is not first in our lives, then we have put something
else in front of Him. Exodus 20:2-3 says, “I am the Lord your God, who brought
you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods
before me.” School, work, and family may not be other gods—or at least we don’t
think of them that way, but if they come before God then we have our priorities
wrong. God purchased us with His own son, Jesus Christ, that we would no longer
be slaves to sin, but slaves to righteousness, that is, slaves to Him (Romans
6:1-7, 15-18). This is why Jesus says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and
burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,
for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
From my yoke is easy and my burden is light (Matthew 11:28-30).”
God hasn’t just freed us from our sin so that we can chose
to live obedient lives, he purchased us from our old master who made us live
sinful lives, so that we can now be His slaves who do righteous deeds instead. When
we answered His call, we chose right then and there to submit ourselves to His
Kingship, leadership, and instructions. One of those instructions was that we keep
Him first, keep His laws on our hearts, and seek to obey His voice.
So saying that work, or sleep, or TV, or some other activity
is more important that spending time with God doesn’t really work. I know that
Jesus is my Savior, but I forget that He is also my King and my boss. I think
this happens a lot. We expect Jesus to save us, rescue us, help us, and heal
us. We forget that he does all this, but that he also demands obedience to his
Kingship. If I was truly making God first in my life, Holy Week could not have
crept up on me, because I would be waiting for it with joy.
The Jews of the first century AD had the opposite problem.
They struggled to make God first in their lives as well, but their expectations
were different from ours. They expected their messiah to be a King who would
save them from their enemies (the Romans) and would reestablish the Davidic
Kingdom and make everything work right and be peachy keen. They didn’t expect a
servant King who would die for them to save them from themselves and their sin.
Denver Seminary is doing a great podcast series on the Holy
Week, and the first two posts (Sunday and today) have talked about people’s
expectations of Jesus.[1]
Today’s pod casts ends with the question, what do we expect of Christ? And I
would like us all to reflect on that. He is King and Savior, kind and gentle,
yet powerful and wrathful. Do our expectations of Christ fit with who he really
is? Who is it we are celebrating on Easter Sunday?
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