Judges 9:22-10:18 / Luke 24:13-53 / Psalm 100 / Proverbs 14:11-12
The passage in Luke is interesting because Jesus intentionally hid His identity from two of His followers as He walked and talked with them heading to the village of Emmaus. I wonder why He did that. Was it to get an incognito summary of the events without any bias of them knowing Who He was?
Or did Jesus love surprises and “gotchas”? That has me wondering if Jesus and His disciples played the game where you hide and jump out to scare your buddy!
Then Jesus appeared suddenly in a room where everyone was talking about the two who had walked with Him toward Emmaus. And again, another gotcha! It says the whole group was startled and frightened, thinking they were seeing a ghost! Jesus had to have known they would respond this way.
He was quick to reassure them, so I’m not saying this was a game to Jesus. It is interesting, however, that Jesus told His disciples for three years about the things that were going to happen, but no one understood Him. Or perhaps they had no frame of reference for such things – even though studying the scriptures would have given them all this same information.
How often does Jesus appear in our lives and we are either surprised or we miss His presence because we are not expecting Him? We pray for His help, and we’re often surprised when He answers or shows up in some way. Why do we do that? Is it because we don’t believe what we pray?
I think it’s more often because Jesus shows up in a way and at a time that we don’t expect. We have a certain outcome in mind when we pray, but we should pray and present our needs to God, leaving the “how” up to Him. What if we instead prayed, said amen, then began looking for how He might answer, keeping our hearts open to all possibilities?
I’ve said many times that following Jesus is a mystery and an adventure all tied together. If we would view our relationship as such, we might instead look for clues and signs of His nearness and presence indicating that He is at work. I know this much – He hears us when we pray. And He is excited to begin the answer as soon as He hears!
That leads me to a reminder that after we pray, we should expect His answer. I didn’t say we should expect a certain outcome; but we should expect the answer. Who’s ready to pray?!
