May 21 - The Choice

May 21 – The Choice

“Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.” Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die. The crowd answered him, “We have heard from the law that the Messiah remains forever. How can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?” Jesus said to them, “The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.” After Jesus had said this, he departed and hid from them. (John 12:27-36)
If we want to do anything in this world, sometimes we have to face things that we would rather avoid. 

I hope that none of us actually believes that Jesus was looking forward to His torture and crucifixion.  Just as we don’t anticipate death until we are closer to approaching it, there is no way that Jesus, as a human, wanted to face what He knew was coming.

The thing is, He actually could have said, “Father, save me from this hour,” and if He meant it, everything would have changed.  He could have saved Himself and allowed the world to go to hell. 

But, it was to save the world that Jesus came to earth.  It was to offer hope that He continued to move forward to the crucifixion.  It was to honor God that He did any of this so that we could understand what complete and unfettered obedience really is.

We make choices every day to do things that seem distasteful or difficult.  We whine about having to make those choices, complaining that it all seems so unfair.

The glory of it is that we GET to make those choices.  We are living a life that is a gift and we live in hope because of a choice that was made long ago.  Do you understand that there was a choice made by Jesus?  He made it for us.  When you have to make difficult choices – who do you make them for?