Offended 6

August 23-26, 2013 – Manna by Dorothy Callies

Matthew 26:31-32 Then saith Jesus unto them, All ye shall be offended because of me this night: for it is written, I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered abroad.  But after I am risen again, I will go before you into Galilee.

There was a Passover event that all the disciples gathered together with Christ. They just had the communion, breaking of breads and drank the fruit of the vine and that Jesus offered a New Covenant with them. The Passover represented Christ as the Lamb that was about to be sacrificed. The disciples had no clue that was going to happen to the Son of God.

This was why Jesus told them, “Tonight all of you will desert me. For the Scriptures say, ‘God will strike the Shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.” But after I have been raised from the dead, I will go ahead of you to Galilee to meet you there” (NLT). Jesus was foretelling them of their falling away. He knew that after His resurrection, they would remember His words and be able to return more easily and understand more fully and to become stronger.

The word offends means to stumble, to fall or to cause to stumble. When Jesus was arrested, the apostles questioned and wondered if Christ was really the Messiah. He did not resist arrest, and He did not use His mighty power. He was not leading the people in an uprising against the Romans, nor was He freeing Israel and setting up the nation as the center of God’s kingdom.

The disciples would be offended because Jesus was rejected. He was rejected by the crowd. But God had a plan. Behind the scenes, in the invisible world, it was God who smote the Shepherd; that is God put Christ to death. It was in “the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God” that Christ was to die (Acts 2:23). Christ had to give His life for man if man was to be saved.

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have ever lasting life (John 3:16). But God showed His love toward us while we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Ro.5:8). The disciples learned later that everything served a purpose even they being offended, they would come back to Christ.

Christ had promised a Comforter who would bring all things to remember everything what Jesus had said to them. They would become stronger because of the words of Christ. Have you ever been offended by anything that you thought that God had failed to keep His Words? We need a Comforter to speak to us, to encourage us, and to remind us day by day that God’s strength is made perfect in weakness.

So let us learn to trust in God even when we don’t understand some things yet.