MURDER IN THE AIR
BY: Frank Tunstall, D. Min.
The highest drama and at the same time the most profound instruction by the Master Teacher mark the last week of Jesus’ life before His crucifixion. Known as Passion Week, the story portrays the rawest pain of rejection and betrayal, and the cruelest depths of persecution and suffering.
It also celebrates the greatest triumph of all history when Jesus walked out of His tomb, never to die again.
After Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, He led His disciples away from Bethany to a village named Ephraim located East of the Jordan River (John 11:54). His stay there was a time of rest before facing the ordeal of crucifixion only a few days away. It also kept the Lord exactly on His timeline leading up to the hour when the High Priest would offer the paschal lamb, the lamb chosen as the annual sacrifice. Then, Israel’s families could go forward to celebrate the Passover meal.
That hour was also the time when Jesus the Lamb of God would be crucified as our Passover Lamb. Jesus is the perfect Paschal Lamb (John 1:29, 36: 1 Corinthians 5:7).
Jesus chose not to heal Lazarus because the Lord intended to raise Him from the dead, a much higher and more God honoring purpose. The miracle occurred after Lazarus’ lifeless body had rested in a cold tomb for four days and was already beginning to decompose.
THINK ABOUT IT: Do you, my reader, have some sin or an issue in your life that reeks with stench, but so far you have been unable to do anything about it? Right now, in fact, you could be surrounded by the stinking smell, and you hate it but can’t seem to get rid of it.
Please open your heart to realize Jesus is with you, standing in the middle of your pain, saying, Take me to the nastiest thing in your life. And when you go there with Him, He says, Roll away the stone.
To obey, of course, will make the whiffs even worse, albeit temporarily (John 11:39). Will you obey Jesus and surrender to Him the most hurtful thing in your life? Then you can watch Him heal it!
John’s account of Lazarus’ resurrection ends with a celebration banquet given in Jesus’ honor (John 12:1- 11). Lazarus was reclining at the table with the others in attendance. He was Exhibit Number One and added convincing proof to the case that Jesus is the Son of God.
The same meal that so deservingly celebrated the Lord was interrupted by ugly bickering. The rudeness erupted because Mary poured a jar of perfume worth a year’s wage on Jesus’ feet and wiped His feet with her hair. Judas saw her act as waste and minced no words saying so. The other disciples joined Judas’ criticism. Jesus had to step into the table fuss and defend Mary. He did it describing her act as “a good work.” Mary had prophetically anointed Jesus for His burial. But to Judas, that perfume was worth more to them than Jesus! (see Matthew 26:10; Mark 14:3-9).
The Bible is completely honest and that very integrity adds to its believability; it tells the good and the bad. The table fuss was ugly.
The miracle of Jesus raising Lazarus motivated Caiaphas the High Priest to call the Sanhedrin into session and put out an all-points bulletin for Jesus’ arrest (John 11:57).
Mark’s record suggests it was right after this meal and the rebuke Judas received from Jesus that Judas went to the High Priests and offered to betray Jesus. This reprimand mixed with greed could have been involved in Judas’ motives. But neither Mark nor any other gospel writer specified why Judas turned traitor (Mark 14:10-15; Acts 1:17). Because the Scriptures are silent on the subject, we should spend very little time speculating about questions the Bible does not answer. Our assignment is to stay focused on Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God.
The bitter hatred against Jesus was so thick in Jerusalem the chief priests even started plotting to kill Lazarus (John 12:10). They did not carry through with the plan perhaps because they realized Jesus could raise him again. Jesus was the one they wanted to silence.
An ominous cloud of satanic darkness was hanging over Jerusalem.
In that ugly setting, Lazarus’ undeniable restoration to life was cause for great rejoicing among Jesus’ followers. But to the Lord’s critics, it only served to make an already dark cloud even blacker.
Murder was in the air.
Jerusalem and its temple had seen many storms in its millennium-long Jewish history, but none like this. The stakes were very high. The religious leaders in control of Jerusalem had put to death over the centuries many prophets who challenged the system (Matthew 23:31-39; Luke 11:47- 51; 13:32-35). But this storm had no parallel. So called Godly priests intended to murder the Lamb of God. It was the mother of all Jerusalem’s storms.
THINK ABOUT IT:
When ‘religion’ is not anchored in Jesus Christ it always mixes with raw governmental power. The result is murder can indeed fill the air, taking the lives of even God’s saints. The Son of God and our Savior Himself was hours away from being murdered.
The brutal murder by crucifixion of an innocent man, none less than the God-man who was the Lamb of God Himself, was about to take place.
But that is not the whole story.
Ah! The Holy Spirit was in Jerusalem too. Jesus turned the rawest evil into eternal good at Calvary. Then He walked out of His grave three days later as the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, never to die again (Acts 3:13-15).
Jesus, keep me near the cross,
There a precious fountain.
Free to all, a healing stream,
Flows from Calvary’s mountain.In the cross, in the cross,
Be my glory ever.
Till my raptured soul shall find,
Rest beyond the river.By: Jonathan Hibbard
