Jesus "Parabled"

What Did Jesus Do?

Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour.
John 12.27

Sure, Jesus taught many parables, stories which conveyed a significant, though often unexpected, even uncomfortable, moral or religious message. Perhaps the Lord was so good at employing parables because his life was, in some respects, a parable itself.

Before the birth of Jesus the Jewish people had many expectations and ideas about the coming Messiah. What caused them no little problem with Jesus was that, while he seemed in many ways to fill much of those expectations, in other ways he simply did not “fit the mold” of what many thought the Messiah should be and do. Jesus was, like many of the parables he taught, full of surprises.

It is likely that there was no greater surprise, even though Jesus predicted on several occasions the manner of his suffering and death, than when the Lord told a crowd in Jerusalem that the reason he was there at that time was so that he would be lifted up (crucified). “But the Christ (Messiah) is supposed to remain forever. How can he be lifted up?” (John 12.34)

So often parables offer corrective lessons, they dispel misconceptions, they redirect hearts and minds from moral mistakes to moral truths. There are no greater moral truths, convicting and surprising as they are, than those taught by the life of Jesus. He is the parable we must hear, the lesson we must learn, the truth we must know. And above all, we must understand that Jesus came to suffer and die, it was the one inescapable hour of his life, it was his purpose. For thereby would the Father be glorified, the world judged, the ruler of this world cast down, and all people drawn unto the Savior. (John 12.28, 30-32)

Though there was more than ample evidence that Jesus was exactly who he claimed to be, many just could not believe the difficult truths of the parable that was the Christ. (John 12.37-40) And many still refuse to believe.

One way we can help those who still don’t believe is to continue to provide parables from which they may yet learn. Not just by sharing the parables that Jesus taught, but by following His example and living lives that are parables which glorify God. Of course, we must be prepared to be discomforted, for living a parable is not easy or fun. And we must be willing to sometimes afflict the comfortable who will be disturbed by the parables of our lives. Of course, there will also be the afflicted who will take comfort from our living parables as well.

It so much easier to view the hardest of moral truths in the abstract; it is so daunting to try to live them out day by day. Though the world will variously laugh at us, dismiss us, oppose us, and persecute us, are we willing to live the parable of faith that trusts in God even as it glorifies Him? That’s what Jesus did.

S.D.G.

Jim
www.jimwilkenministries.org
Marion, NC
PS 37.4