Tehillah Generation Chapel
Daily Manna | Monday, April 23, 2018 | Reading: Exodus 33:1-11, Exodus 4, Gen 3:1-21
Topic: The Tabernacle of God 415
Scripture: But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say not of this building. (Heb 9:11)
Note: Matt 16:18, “And I say also to you, You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” The worsening relationship and the growing emotional distance between Judas and Jesus was a self inflicted one on the part of Judas as a result of the decisions that he took with passage of time in his relationship with Jesus. The worsening situation of Judas was caused by the consistently disappointing vibes that he kept getting from Jesus regarding His future and approaching death.
To Judas, death meant failure just like the way the average person views death. To him, the political prospects of Jesus were so good and solid at the base that the risk of failure in the possible quest to mobilise the masses as an army to topple the Roman regime would have almost been nil. Death wasn’t a threat to Jesus looking at it from the tone of His speeches and His known capacity to raise the dead back to life. Neither was any injury to anyone under His leadership going to be a problem. Judas might have done all his calculations and analysis of the prospects for the Jesus movement. Judas was seeing thriving business and political opportunities that Jesus wasn’t considering.
Judas had considered the detailed logistical constraints that could possibly confront the movement in a potential fight against the formidable Roman forces. In all his analysis, Jesus was at the centre of it all. Talk of the constraints of food for the masses in a long, sustained war against the Romans: Jesus was able to miraculously feed five thousand men and four thousand men on separate occasions in the desert using a single lunch pack.
Talk of losing men during the potential war against the Roman army, and there wouldn’t be problem with shortage of fighting men. Jesus had already demonstrated His capability to raise the dead back to life on more than one occasion. Even, dead, decomposing and rotten Lazarus was raised whole back to life after four days buried in the grave. Lazarus walked the streets of Jerusalem again after his resurrection. Injuries to His soldiers? That’s not a problem. Jesus was the greatest healer and miracle worker that ever walked the earth. To think that Jesus kept talking about His impending death in the midst of all these advantages that He wielded, must have seemed like the most spectacular waste of human resources ever witnessed on earth. Judas must have concluded to himself.
Food for thought: Jesus completely emptied Himself for humanity through His sacrificial death on the cross.
Declaration: Then one of the twelve, called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests, and said to them, “What will you give me, and I will deliver Him to you?” And they covenanted with him for thirty pieces of silver. Matt 26:14,15
©Author: Rev Fred Aboe
