The #1 thing to remember – if you are praying, reading the Bible and going to church then you probably ARE walking in power even if you don’t feel like it! The devil is going to try to mislead you. “I’m useless, I’m not doing what God wants me to, I’ve still got this problem so I can’t be effective, this happened and that ruined everything, blah blah blah.”

Here are 4 reasons that we don’t feel powerful – and why we’re probably wrong.

#1. God is teaching you to depend on Him and not on yourself. Ask for discernment so you can see where God is using you, especially around your spiritual gifts. Praise God for using you in this way!

See, the Sovereign LORD comes with power,
and he rules with a mighty arm.
See, his reward is with him,
He tends his flock like a shepherd:
He gathers the lambs in his arms
and carries them close to his heart;
he gently leads those that have young. (Is. 40:10-11)

#2. God is helping you to root out deeply entrenched sin or guilt. You have unresolved sin in your life that is stopping the flow of power. We are all sinners and we can certainly keep bearing fruit in some areas, but some sin really gums up the works and God is working with you on it. Ask God for discernment about a sin that’s stopping you from realizing a lot of blessing. Remember that we are forgiven, and if you are confessing your sin and trying to obey then you will still bear fruit!

You may also be dealing with guilt over an old sin or sins that are over and done with. Ask for forgiveness and know that you have it.

Comfort, comfort my people,
says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and proclaim to her
that her hard service has been completed,
that her sin has been paid for,
that she has received from the LORD’s hand
double for all her sins. (Is. 40:1-2)

#3. Satan is telling you all sorts of lies so you don’t really believe you can have power in Christ! Study the power of God in the Bible and pray that God helps you to see the truth about Him, and receive His blessing and power. Remember that Satan is the father of lies! If you hear a discouraging voice inside your head that is NOT the voice of our loving Savior! The Holy Spirit may warn you about something but He will not condemn you.

Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say:
“Now have come the salvation and the power
and the kingdom of our God,
and the authority of his Messiah.
For the accuser of our brothers and sisters,
who accuses them before our God day and night,
has been hurled down. (Rev. 12:10)

#4. God has you walking through the desert in order to learn and grow. Trust in Him and keep walking because He’s walking right alongside you!

A voice of one calling:
“In the wilderness prepare
the way for the LORD;
make straight in the desert
a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be raised up,
every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
the rugged places a plain.
And the glory of the LORD will be revealed,
and all people will see it together.
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” (Is. 40:3-5)

Just keep going – and trust Him for the strength you need. He will give it to you whether you feel like you’re flying, running or just trudging along.

He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint. (Isaiah 40:29-31)

And…

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever! Amen.  (Eph. 3:20-21)

Immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine? I can imagine a lot! So if you are not experiencing power in your life, what’s the deal?

There are TWO KEYS that open the door to power. One is obvious — and one isn’t.

• The master key is Christ. Look – His Holy Spirit is inside of us. It is His death, resurrection and ascension that allowed us to receive great power. This power is very real and is always available to us when we act in the will of God. Satan actively works to keep us blinded to the great power available to us in Christ Jesus. Christ’s body IS the church! Christ is not LIMITED to the church but the church embodies His power and presence in the world. He is the key to unlock salvation and the entry into the kingdom of God.
• There is another key – our own need and weakness. We think of our weakness as blocking the power of Christ. But that isn’t true at all. Because when we admit our weakness to God, THEN His power flows into our lives. From 2 Cor. 12:9 “’My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” Note that I knew the FIRST part of the verse. I didn’t realize until just this morning that the verse has a Part 2!

What Are our Weaknesses?

There are lots of kinds of weaknesses. Let’s look at 5 in particular: sin, insults, hardships, persecution, and calamity. The last 4 are from Paul’s list in 2 Cor. 12.

1. Sin — One weakness is certainly sin. We are sinful creatures. Sin can block up the flow of power, but we are also under grace! If we waited to be sinless before we had God’s power, we’d be waiting a really, really long time. Pray to be healed from sin and temptation, confess your sin, and God will forgive and empower us in spite of our weakness.
2. Insults — When people make snarky comments about you or about what we believe. When gossip gets back to you it hurts. (By the way – DON’T GOSSIP!) Or someone says something insulting to your face, or even when you read some really rude person who hates Christianity and Christians.
3. Hardships — Tough circumstances that are hard to bear. They may be forced on you or they may be consequences of your own bad decisions. Whatever caused them, they are happening and they are no fun at all.
4. Persecutions — When people abuse you because of your faith. This is not as obvious in this country as it is in countries with active political or social persecution. But there are people around who seriously will not like you because you are a believer. In the U.S. this generally takes the form of people thinking you are judgmental, mean, weak, or deluded. Or all of the above. They will try to get back at you if they can, with words if nothing else.
5. Disasters – These are the really big things like bankruptcy, losing your house, losing your job, losing loved ones, major illnesses. These are terrible things to walk through.

Yet in all of these things, what did God tell Paul? Let’s read it again: “’My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” (2 Cor. 12:9)

So when you feel weak, you know what? Turn to God in prayer and ask HIM to make you strong with HIS power, not with your own! Ask and you will receive.

As I was studying this, I felt bad because I don’t feel powerful at all these days. But you know what? Good! Because I needed to let God fill me with HIS power, not mine. Mine is tiny and inadequate and is based on feeling confident about stuff. What I need to do is have confidence in HIM and HIS power in me.

We may feel weak. In fact, we are! But we don’t STOP there. Our own weakness lets us look to Christ and Christ alone. Amen.

“Ephraim is like a dove,
easily deceived and senseless—
now calling to Egypt,
now turning to Assyria.” (Hosea 7:11)

The book was probably written in the 8th century BC by the same circle of prophets who wrote down the deeds of Elijah and Elisha in 1 and 2 Kings and 1 and 2 Chronicles. This is not fiction, it is an inspired report of the prophet Jonah’s experiences in Nineveh of the Assyrians.

Historical Background

Jonah was a prophet during the 8th century reign of Israel’s King Jeroboam II, who ruled for 41 years. At that time Israel was divided into the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah. Jerusalem and the Temple were located in Judah, so the rival kings of Israel tried to institute their own places of worship within their borders.

At the time of Jonah, Jeroboam was a very successful military leader. He had crushed Israel’s conqueror Syria and their capital city of Damascus. The Assyrian Empire and the great royal city of Nineveh was a threat but they had not yet started the series of invasions that would later destroy Israel.

But the northern kingdom, whose capital was Samaria, was proud, rich, oppressive, and apostate because the kings supported cultic worship in conflict with the Temple in Jerusalem. And the prophets Hosea, Joel, Jonah and Amos all rose up during this period to warn the Israelites that God was not pleased! Later the northern kingdom would fall permanently to Assyria.

In fact, listen to this: archeologists recovered inscriptions from the Assyrian king Sargon’s palace about these very events! One inscription reads: “The inhabitants of Samaria, who plotted with another king against me, not to do service and not to bring tribute and who did battle, I fought against them with the power of the great gods, my lords. I counted as spoil 27,280 people, together with their chariots, and gods, in which they trusted. I formed a unit with 200 of [their] chariots for my royal force. I settled the rest of them in the midst of Assyria. I repopulated Samaria more than before. I brought into it people from countries conquered by my hands. I appointed my eunuch as governor over them. And I counted them as Assyrians.”

But here is the thing. While Hosea, Joel and Amos were called to prophesy to Israel and warn it to repent, Jonah was given a different mission. He was supposed to go to Nineveh, Assyria’s royal city, and call them to repent too! And he didn’t want to go! So he thought he would run away from God. This was a big part of his problem, that he identified God completely with Israel. Remember that the ancient world believed in local and regional gods, and the farther you went from their physical locations the less power they had. Of course that is not true of God and Israel knew it.

Psalm 139:7-12 says:
7 Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.

But we can understand how Jonah felt that way. So when God told Jonah to go to Nineveh and preach to them, he did what any red-blooded 8th century guy would do – he ran away! He went to the Jewish port of Jaffa and set sail as a passenger for the Asia Minor port city of Tarshish. By the way, we can’t be sure but Tarshish may have been the NT city of Tarsus where the apostle Paul would be born 800 years later.

But God sent a huge storm that nearly broke up the ship. The sailors were shouting and praying to their own gods – the Bible says “each cried out to his own god” (Jonah 1:5). As all this is going on, Jonah ended up confessing to the sailors that he was a prophet of the Lord and that he was running away from his God “who made the sea and the dry land.” (Jonah 1:9) Jonah heroically told them to toss him overboard since the storm was his fault.

By the way, this may not be the great act of courage that it looks like. Jonah apparently made a habit of asking God to just kill him and get it over with, as we will see later in the book. To their credit, the sailors tried not to kill him. “Instead, the men did their best to row back to land. But they could not, for the sea grew even wilder than before.” (Jonah 1:13) They ended up praying to to the Lord as well. Note that the Bible makes it very clear that they stopped praying to their own gods right then, and prayed to the God who had power over the waves, far from his own Temple. And quite unlike their own weak gods! This is the first example in Jonah of God displaying His power and mercy to Gentiles! So they tossed Jonah overboard at his own request. “At this the men greatly feared the LORD, and they offered a sacrifice to the LORD and made vows to him.” (Jonah 1:16)

But Jonah did NOT drown. The Lord sent a giant fish to swallow him up, and Jonah spent 3 days and nights inside the creature. He did not curse God but praised Him with a beautiful prayer found in Jonah chapter 2.

8 “Those who cling to worthless idols
turn away from God’s love for them.
9 But I, with shouts of grateful praise,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
I will say, ‘Salvation comes from the LORD.’” (Jonah 2:8-9)

Now – everybody asks how Jonah could have survived 3 days in the belly of a great fish or whale. It is possible for a large whale like a blue or sperm whale to swallow a human whole, also great white sharks could do it. And they have multi-chambered stomachs where the first stomach does not have digestive juices. Air would be a problem though! Ultimately I believe that God rescued Jonah miraculously from going overboard, and I think He did it with a marine creature that He prepared. Do we honestly believe that the creator of all animals could not create a creature anymore?

After 3 days the creature expelled Jonah onto dry land. We don’t know the location of the land, but God told Jonah again to go to Nineveh and preach that it would be destroyed unless it turned to God.

This was exactly the same message that God gave Jonah’s contemporaries to preach to Jerusalem, but this message was to the Gentiles! This time Jonah did what God said, traveled to the great city of Nineveh, and started to preach in the streets. His message? If they did not repent and turn to the real God, in 40 days Nineveh would be destroyed! Jonah may have expected to be run out of town, even martyred. But what happened? Nineveh listened! The people believed what Jonah was saying! And when the message of the prophet reached the King (or Royal Governor) of Nineveh, he commanded a city-wide fast and repentance! And this was a city that worshipped multiple “gods!” So the Bible says that because they repented, God did not destroy them at that time.

By the way — later on Assyria would fall into evil again and God reinstituted His judgment. In 612 BC, about 150 years after Jonah’s trip, Nineveh would be utterly destroyed by a combined force of Medes and Babylonians. It would never rise again from the ashes. Its ruins were discovered in 1909 located close to the Iraqi city of Mosul. Even the ruins are unprotected from weather, modern building, and looting, and it is a sad and lonely place.

But at Jonah’s time that generation was saved because God loved them, and generations after them would have been saved as well if they had been faithful to God.

Jonah’s Response

Well, you’d think that Jonah would be happy about his successful prophetic mission.

You would be wrong. He was furious! He didn’t WANT the Ninevites to be saved, he hated them! God spoke to Jonah about that. God’s words are among the most moving in the Bible. God said about the violent Ninevites: “Should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?” (Jonah 4:11) God did not WANT to destroy 120,000 ignorant people OR their animals! We concentrate a lot in the OT on the cities and people that God directed the Hebrews to destroy. He is a sovereign God and really doesn’t owe a sinful world a thing. But He is both Justice AND Love, and He wanted to save Nineveh’s people and their animals from destruction. And when they turned to Him in time, He did.

The story ends there. We don’t know Jonah’s response but we can guess. He must have made his way back to Israel because his story was recorded, and God’s words of love and concern were written down. That is why I believe that Jonah repented for good this time.

Finally, Jesus referred to the story as a prophecy of His own coming to Jew and Gentile.

38 Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said to him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from you.”
39 He answered, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. 40 For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. 41 The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now something greater than Jonah is here. (Matthew 12:38-41)

Jonah was a prophecy not only to the Gentile city of Nineveh, but it was also a Messianic prophecy to the Jews – and to us. Amen.

Jesus rode a donkey into Jerusalem. The city was crowded with Passover pilgrims and the people lining the route lay down their cloaks and small branches of trees to cover His path. They sang or chanted part of Psalms 118: “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. We bless you from the house of the Lord.”

Remember that word about Jesus’ raising of Lazarus had spread from Bethany to Jerusalem like wildfire, and the whole city was agog with the news of Jesus. The Orthodox church is more aware of this linkage than is the Western Church, and part of their Palm Sunday liturgy is this beautiful poem:

O Christ our God
When Thou didst raise Lazarus from the dead before Thy Passion,
Thou didst confirm the resurrection of the universe.
Wherefore, we like children,
carry the banner of triumph and victory,
and we cry to Thee, O Conqueror of Death,
Hosanna in the highest!
Blessed is He that cometh
in the Name of the Lord.

During the Triumphal Entry, many of the Jews there believed He was the Messiah, which of course He was. THAT is what they were celebrating. They believed He would be the military Savior, the one who would throw off the rule of the Romans! That’s what they thought when He entered the city that day. How fast they would turn on Him in just a few days! Jesus knew that too, knew that the very same crowd that was cheering for him would be screaming “Crucify him!” just days from then.

So it was no accident, no accident at all that Jesus chose to ride in on a donkey and not a horse. The warlike horse was the symbol of chariots, generals and conquering armies. Jesus would have looked like a military hero riding in on a warhorse. But a donkey was a symbol of peace and patience in this culture, and kings might ride the donkey if their message was peace and not war. This is why we say that Jesus came to the city as the Prince of Peace in the book of Isaiah: “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” (Is. 9:6)

Why did the people cover Jesus’ path in branches and cloaks? It was a Near Eastern custom to cover the pathway of a king or other highly honored visitor. The type of branch had a special meaning in Israel since the palm branch was a symbol of the greatness of God and His abundant gifts to His people, the book of Leviticus holds a command about celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles:  “On the first day you are to take branches from luxuriant trees—from palms, willows and other leafy trees—and rejoice before the LORD your God for seven days.” (Leviticus 23:40)  And Revelation prophecies that the redeemed will do the same: “After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.” (Rev. 7:9)

The Chronology

Let’s look at the series of events, symbols and prophecies that surrounded the Triumphal Entry and the Passion to come.

Jesus was in Bethany, not far from Jerusalem, where He had just raised Lazarus. He sent His disciples to arrange for the loan of a young donkey that had not yet been ridden. Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion! Shout, Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. (Zech. 9:9)
Now, I did not realize this – but the crowds had gathered BEFORE He got to Jerusalem. We think about Him entering the city and then they celebrated, but it started just after He left Bethany riding on the donkey. All along the 2-mile road people were throwing down branches and cloaks. When He reached to the Mount of Olives to the east of Jerusalem He could see the city below Him. AND HE CRIED. As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it and said, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s coming to you.” (Luke 19:41-44)

Reflection: What did He mean by that, since they were celebrating His coming to the city at the time?

The location of the Mount of Olives is significant because it it the hill on which the Lord as Conqueror will wage His battles in the Last Days. On that day his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, east of Jerusalem, and the Mount of Olives will be split in two from east to west, forming a great valley, with half of the mountain moving north and half moving south. (Zech. 14:4)

Jesus then kept moving through the crowds, descended the road from the Mount of Olives and rode through Jerusalem’s eastern gate.

And where did Jesus go next? The people probably expected an immediate rebellion against the Romans. But instead Jesus… WENT INTO THE TEMPLE AND DROVE OUT THE MONEY CHANGERS! Not the Romans — the Jews, His own people. He cleansed His Father’s house, just as He was about to cleanse the hearts of all who would believe in Him.

Jerusalem at the Feast of Dedication (John 10:22-39)

Jesus was in Jerusalem for the Feast of Dedication, what we call Hanukah today. It celebrated the re-dedication of the Temple in 165 BC, which the Seleucid Emperor Antiochus Epiphanes had half destroyed and desecrated. Judas the Maccabee was the leader of the rebellion against the Seleucid Empire, no relation to Judas Iscariot!

Jesus was in the Temple when a number of Jews surrounded him and told Him to say plainly if He was the Christ or not. So he did. They tried to stone Him for it but He “escaped their grasp.”

North to Samaria (John 10:40-43)

Jesus and his disciples left Jerusalem and followed the Jordan north to the site of John the Baptist’s baptizing ministry, which was in Samaria. Many people there still revered John the Baptist and believed in Jesus because of what John had said about him. There was probably a mix of Samaritans and Jews. Contrast this with the reaction of the Jews in Jerusalem!

While there, Lazarus – the brother of Mary and Martha – was sick. The family lived all the way back down near Jerusalem in the town of Bethany. They must have know where Jesus was because they sent a messenger to Jesus to come and heal Lazarus. It took 1 day travel on foot for the messengers to reach Jesus.

In fact, Lazarus was already dead by then as we find out later on in the story. He must have died shortly after the messengers left, but there was no way to catch the messengers and tell them that.

When they gave Jesus the message he replied “This sickness will not end in death.” His listeners thought he meant Lazarus would not die; instead he meant that he would raise Lazarus from the dead.

Knowing Lazarus was already dead, Jesus waited for 2 more days to set out on his journey. He told the disciples he was returning to Judea, or central Israel whose capital city is Jerusalem. He told the disciples that Lazarus has died but that Jesus was going to raise him. The disciples were more interested in the fact that the Jews had just tried to kill Jesus in Jerusalem and now he’s going back?! Bethany was just a couple of miles from the great city.

Thomas – who we sometimes call “Doubting Thomas” – told the others “Let us also go, that we may die with him.” I changed my opinion of Thomas after reading this.

It took 1 travel day for Jesus to reach Bethany. So 4 days passed since Mary and Martha sent the messengers to Jesus. Note that Jesus did NOT wait around for Lazarus to die! Lazarus was already dead by the time the messengers reached him.

Bethany (John 11)

Jesus arrived in Bethany. Martha greeted him (Mary and the other mourners stayed in the house) and Martha told him that her brother would not have died had Jesus been there. Jesus told her that her brother would live, and Martha confirmed that she believed he would be resurrected  at the last day. This was true of course for believers, but Jesus went a giant step further – he reminded her that “I am the resurrection and the life.” Martha answered in faith and trust and went to get her sister Mary. Mary and the mourners now join them and both women are crying. And…

“Jesus wept.” The word means quiet tears running down his face, in contrast to the shouts and cries of the mourners. Jesus knew he was going to raise Lazarus but he also fully felt his friends’ pain and agony. God doesn’t shrug when bad things happen to us and tell us to get over it because it’ll end up OK. It will end up great – but God cares about our pain and helps us through it.

Jesus approaches the tomb, which was a cave in a hillside with a stone rolled in front of it to keep predators out. This is similar to what Jesus’ tomb would look like! In fact, Jesus knew EXACTLY what he was doing!

Now we find out why Jesus got there 4 days after Lazarus’ death. He told the bystanders to roll away the stone but Martha told him that the corpse would smell after 4 days. Get this: in Jewish tradition, the spirit of the dead lingers about its body for 3 days. Then it goes to the afterlife. Lazarus was dead, dead, dead!

And Jesus responds “Didn’t I tell  you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” Then he prayed out loud to the Father so the people could hear and know where Jesus’ power came from.  Then Jesus shouted “Lazarus, come out!” I’ll bet that was a shout that shivered the earth!

And Lazarus came out!

Meanwhile, back in Jerusalem. Many of the witnesses believed in Jesus because of the resurrection of Lazarus. Others ran back to Jerusalem and told the Pharisees what had happened. So the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin, which consisted of the Pharisees and Sadducees, some of whom were also priests.

Caiphas was the high priest at that time, serving from 18-36 AD. He was the son-in-law of Annas who had been deposed by the Romans in 15  AD. The high priesthood was supposed to be for life but the Romans often deposed the high priest. If Caiphas lasted as long as he did, it was because he got along just fine with the Empire!

People complained that “everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.” Note that the Sanhedrin were more worried about losing their positions, that came first on their list of fears.

Now Caiphas speaks and he prophesies without knowing it! “Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, spoke up, “You know nothing at all! You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”  He did not say this on his own, but as high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the Jewish nation, and not only for that nation but also for the scattered children of God, to bring them together and make them one. So from that day on they plotted to take his life. (John 11:49-53)

In spite of his personal evil and sin, Caiphas prophesied through the power of the Holy Spirit — even though he didn’t know it! God is sovereign.

Ephraim

Jesus however was on his own timetable and knew that he would come back to Jerusalem during the Passover to die on His own terms. So he and his disciples withdrew to the desert town of Ephraim to wait. I’ll bet the disciples thought they’d dodged a bullet, not dreaming that Jesus would shortly return to Jerusalem again – this time to die.

Personal Application

Study: What are the parallels in this story and Christ’s coming passion?

Meditation: Picture yourself lying in that tomb. See your body covered with graveclothes. Silent. Cold. Alone. Then hear the stone scrape and fall aside and a strong and loving voice call out your name — “Come out!”