“BEHOLD THE POOREST KING THAT EVER LIVED…”
📖Isa 50:4-7; Psalm 22:8-9, 17-18a, 19-20, 23-24 (R.v.2a); Phil 2:6-11; Luke 22:14 23:56
🎤“BEHOLD THE POOREST KING THAT EVER LIVED…”
The above statement comes from the Stations of the Cross at the station where Jesus was stripped of his clothes. What does being poor mean here? It definitely does not mean poverty because another statement follows, “…Possessing nothing, I own all.” Hence that must be pointing to something in the neighborhood of one of the beatitudes that says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 5:3).
So as we celebrate the triumphant entry of Jesus into Jerusalem, which is otherwise known as Palm Sunday, we are called to reflect on a matter of great importance today – humility.
Are we really among the people that feel so important and need to be appreciated over the position of authority they occupy or what they are capable of doing? Do we see ourselves as people who have done so much for God through our faith and righteousness and so need to be repaid by God?
We really need to step down. Listen to what Jesus tells the Pharisees in the Lukan account of the triumphant entry into Jerusalem, when they told him to stop the crowd that was praising him, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out” (Luke 19:40). If God can raise lifeless things to do what we are doing, it shows that we are indeed PRIVILEGED to be doing it. So the approach should simply be that of HUMILITY (cf. Luke 17:10).
We must learn from Jesus who, though was in the form of God, did not cling to his equality with God but emptied himself to assume the position of a servant, a suffering servant at that (cf. Phil 2:6-11). He was hailed a king but he would stoop low later to wash the feet of his disciples. What a rare and unique figure!
It is likely of this suffering servant that Isaiah earlier prophesied of (cf. Isa 50:4-7). He was unjustly attacked but he did not hasten to his own defense. He rather trusted himself to the protection of God because he understood that “our help comes from the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth” (Psalm 124:8; see also Isa 50:7 and Phil 4:13).
We cannot really do anything without help from God. Why then shall we see ourselves as if everything depends on us for survival?
May God give us the grace to embrace the attitude of the suffering servant of the Lord (Isa 50:4-11) in our daily living. Amen.
Have a happy Sunday, spent in humility with God and a glorious Holy Week. Peace be with you.
AMEN N TO UR SPIRIT.
We cannot really do anything without help from
God. Why then shall we see ourselves as if
everything depends on us for survival?
Has he (God) not given us the necessary power to do what we need do?.Genesis 1vs 27 cited ” So God created human beings,making them To BE LIKE HIM. He created them male and female..affirming they (we) were like God in all thing since Gen.2 vs 7 cited that he (God) breathed life, giving breathe into his nostril and man man became to live.that breathe from within father, I believe shows its the whole of him(God)..it is in his person to love man then and now..
When man was sent out of Eden in Gen. 3vs23, nothing was deprived from him save restrictions from Eden and being cursed relative to cultivating the land and labour in child bearing…
Would need clarifications and education on this father.
God bless you.
Thank you so much Kingsley for reading and reflecting. May God bless you always and help you to understand him better.
Now, I think the answer you seek is even in your very intervention above. You noted that God sent the man out of the garden of Eden without taking away their power, right? You are not wrong on that point. In fact, more power was added to the one he previously had – to till the land.
However, if the man had power as much as God as you tried to insinuate, why was God able to send him out of Eden? God wouldn’t have been able to do that without man retaliating.
Well, God made us in his image. The act of breathing into man is a sign that he now lives in man. Whenever, he decides to leave the human body, the person dies. It is is that his image that gives us life. That is we cannot do without him.
I know you may want to ask how come it is that his image in us does not prevent us from sin. It is because this image of God in us does not impose anything on us. God allows us to enjoy the freewill.
By the way, just as God did not stop the devil from tempting Adam and Eve, so he does not stop him from tempting us even though he lives in us.
I hope I was able to help.
Amen