God’s Glory Should Never Come As A Surprise

Today’s reading: Luke 24:13-35

I have often marveled in these devotionals at how Jesus knew precisely all that would happen to him from the moment of his “triumphant” entry to Jerusalem to the agony of his “death” upon the cross.  He knew the torture he would suffer, and with the free will that God grants to all mankind, only Grace compelled him to endure it. Yet Grace was enough.

But today’s reading adds a disturbing twist to this eternally inspirational thought: Jesus was not the only one who had been told of his fate.

“Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.”(Verse 27)

Granted, the prophets were not blatant about the story of the Crucifixion. As far as I can recall, no scripture makes a literal warning along these lines:  “The leaders and people of Israel will foolishly torture and kill their Messiah because they cannot bring themselves to believe that He is, in fact, their King.”

But, clearly, if the people of Jesus’s day on Earth had been paying close attention to their own Holy writings, they would not have been saddened by the Crucifixion nor surprised by the Resurrection.

“Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared!  Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?”” (Verses 25-26)

This makes me realize that the glory of The Bible is easy to miss or, worse, to take for granted. Constant diligence is required of me to not be as “foolish” as the men from today’s reading who naively stumble upon the resurrected Jesus on their path to Emmaus. It’s easy for me to forget in my daily walk that Jesus does promise another return and that it will be even more glorious than The Resurrection.

Thanks be to God for the eternal promise of a glorious life with Him. May I (and we) never let His glory come as a surprise.