Father, I am ready to come together with You. I pray that You will keep my heart and mind attuned to what You would have me think and write. Amen.
John 10:17-21 (<<click here to read the passage)
Excuses, excuses – one of the harder things to find today is someone who will take responsibility for their own faults and failures. I totally realize that horribly bad things happen to us, and they most definitely do impact us. Many things contribute to who we are and how we act. But ultimately it is our choice as to what we do with those things. We can have the worst childhood and have had the worst acts committed against us. But we chose to let those things drag us to the depths and misery or refuse to do so.
Another thing we like to do is to see some atrocity and blame someone for it. We see someone hurt or abused, and immediately we begin pointing fingers at the guilty. Yes, sometimes it is deserved. Many times, it is blatantly obvious who is at fault and who should be held accountable.
A quick reply to the question of who was responsible for Jesus’ inhumane treatment leading to His humiliating death, would bring about the answers of the Pharisees and the Roman government – personified in Pilate. But can we blame them? Were they guilty? Most definitely. But in the end, they just did what humans do. We are awful. We are cruel. And who but God alone knows us…I mean really knows us. In all honesty, He knows us better than we know ourselves. It is most bittersweet that He loves us in spite of who we are and what we do. (See this post for a correction of this last statment!)

“The Father loves me because I sacrifice my life so I may take it back again. No one can take my life from me. I sacrifice it voluntarily. For I have the authority to lay it down when I want to and also to take it up again. For this is what my Father has commanded.” vs17-18 AMP

Today’s passage opens our eyes to the fact that no one took Jesus’ life. He voluntarily sacrificed Himself. It was His call. He could have refused to do it. As the old song goes, “He could have called ten thousand angels…” but He didn’t. Jesus laid down His life…and Jesus took it up again. The Father commanded that it be that way. They played their respective roles, but in the Father’s perfect timing Jewish and Roman leadership did exactly what God knew they would do. Remember, He knows us through and through. We are selfish. We go to great extents to make sure we get what we want. No one gets in our way. We will trample down whomever we need to assure that we do…even God incarnate Himself.
If anyone should be blamed, we all should take that blame. If I had not sinned. If you had not sinned, Jesus would have had no need to lay his life down for us. But we did and He had to.
The Apostle Paul clearly stated in Romans 3:23,

For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. NLT

So, enough of the blame game. Our perfect and holy God extends to each and every one of us forgiveness. It cost Him dearly, but He gives it freely! All praise to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!

July 27th, 2021, Tues, 9:44 pm