In my last blog, we began a journey through the last 8 Days of Jesus’ life on this earth. It is arguably the most important 8 Days in history. It changed the world and hopefully, by reflecting on Jesus’ journey, our lives can be changed as well.
On Day 1, I shared with you about Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, and how through this action Jesus was declaring himself King. Now he is inviting us to allow him to be our King.
Today, I’d like us to cross over into day 2 as Jesus and the disciples wake up in Bethany. After such an amazing experience the day before, you can imagine how excited everyone is to see what this day would produce.
The Bible tells us that Jesus and the disciples, on the way to Jerusalem, where traveling through a fig orchard. As they walked through the orchard, Jesus noticed something peculiar.
You see, it wasn’t fig season. All the trees where bare, kind of like most of the trees around us are right now. Just bare branches and no leaves.
What was unusual is that Jesus noticed that there was one tree, out of all the trees, that had leaves on it. And a fig tree that has leaves, has fruit.
Now I am imagining that Jesus and the disciples got up so early in the morning that they didn’t have breakfast, because Jesus headed over to that tree to get some delicious figs.
Well that was a huge fail, because Jesus, after inspecting the tree, found no figs.
Have you ever felt that moment of disappointment in your life when you are expecting something amazing and you are completely let down?
If you are anything like me, you are a cereal person. Now for reasons of trying to be the sexiest version of myself possible, I have pretty much given up eating cereal.
But in my cereal-eating days, I could down some Fruity Pebbles.
I love cereal. Sugary goodness with almost no preparation necessary.
I love trying to get the perfect milk-to-cereal ratio. You know how good it feels when you scoop the last bit of Lucky Charms and there is no milk left in the bowl. What is better than that?
But even if you don’t get it perfect, and there is still a bit of milk left, you know what you do? You pour some more cereal in the bowl to finish that milk off right!
And here is the best part of eating cereal. When you are done, you rinse off the bowl and spoon, and those instruments are immediately ready for the next round of cereal-eating-bliss.
Now, tell me if this has ever happened to you?
It is the end of a long day. You have battled the forces of evil at work and you are ready to call it a day. You are too tired to cook a meal, so you are going to your quickest and best comfort food: a big old bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch.
You watch as that cereal cascades into the bowl. The sound of the cereal hitting the bowl play a melodic symphony that brings joy to your heart.
You pull out the carton of milk from the fridge and that white liquid snuggles up to those beautiful squares of cinnamon and sugar. You can’t wait to plunge your spoon into that bowl and begin your moment of ecstasy.
You bring your spoon out from under the glorious unity of lactose, sugar, and gluten (sorry all you vegans) and place this culinary crescendo into your mouth and prepare for your taste buds to sing!
But suddenly you realize that all your dreams of the perfect night of cereal eating are over. The milk is sour.
What a disappointment. (Insert crying emoji here.)
This is how I imagine Jesus was feeling. He was hungry. He was looking forward to eating some delicious figs. The tree gave him the erroneous idea that there would be fruit available.
There wasn’t and Jesus is mad. Here is what he said:
Then Jesus said to the tree, “May no one ever eat your fruit again!” And the disciples heard him say it. Mark 11:14 (NLT)
Jesus didn’t whisper these words. He said it loud enough for all to hear. Jesus was ticked off. What does this mean?
Here is what I think it means: Jesus can’t stand fakers.
He doesn’t like fake trees, and he definitely doesn’t like fake people.
We call people who are fake hypocrites, and I believe Jesus wants us to stop being that.
So, on day 3, Jesus will aggressively take on this issue.
But let’s save that for next time.
I would love to hear from you. Email me at milton@ktsy.org to keep the conversation going.