Jesus and Jerusalem

O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!
Matthew 23:37

This lament for the capital city of Israel comes on the heels of Jesus' infamous sermon of seven woes against the scribes and Pharisees who characterized the rejection of His ministry among the people of the nation. It was in Jerusalem that the worship of God was organized at the temple. It was here that the main feasts and celebration of God's worship were practices. This was the city that had just wildly welcomed Him into the city with Messianic fervor. And it was the place where He knew He would die to atone for the sin of the world.

Jerusalem had a history. It was a checkered past, full of triumph and tragedy. It was the place where God was proclaimed. It was also the place where apostasy and idolatry often led to Him being abandoned. It was a political center. It was a social center. And it was the place where the prophets pled with the people to repent, only to be rejected. Jeremiah's tears flowed there, just as Jesus' do at the thought of the spiritual state of the nation encapsulated in the city of Zion.

I find it interesting that Jesus was moved by the spiritual and not the political plight of His people. Not once in the New Testament does He decry the Roman occupation. He calls the people to the worship of Yahweh and like the prophets before Him, takes the religious leaders to task for their abandonment of God's Law. He knows that the spiritual need of Israel is the greatest need of the people. In His message, it is the ONLY need of the people. And love drives Him to continue to care for that need and to decry their deception and rejection of God.

The passion and the heart of Jesus are so clearly shown for us in this account. He understands and speaks to the deepest human need, redemption from sin, acceptance by a loving God, and the soul support and protection such divine favor bestows.

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When God is Grieved

The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart.
Genesis 6:5-6

This is one of the more difficult descriptions of God in all of the Bible. And it comes pretty early in the text. It is the sight of God grieved. The pre-flood narrative shows us a world where promiscuity, violence, wickedness, and power run amuck have become the standard culture of the human race. There is a phrase that is particularly chilling: "that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually."

There is a three-fold intensification of the evil of mankind that is frightful: 1) every intention was 2) only evil 3) continually. That was what finally grieved the heart of God. And the story of Noah is the story of one family's survival in the midst of what God saw as ONLY an evil culture. There was nothing redeeming about it. The solution was to wipe it out and start all over.

When I see God grieved in scripture, I need to take notice. He does not like to see sin in His creation. He does not like to see a society overcome by wickedness. And it will be dealt with. I refrain from social commentary ONLY because it is SO obvious. Today, almost all of society is overcome by an anti-God, naturalistic bias that has led to all sorts of evil being tolerated. In fact, such tolerance is now a virtue to most. Where is it going? I can only think toward grieving God and inevitable, consequential judgment. That is what happens when God is grieved.