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Gospel: Luke 19: 41-44
As Jesus drew near Jerusalem,
he saw the city and wept over it, saying,
“If this day you only knew what makes for peace–
but now it is hidden from your eyes.
For the days are coming upon you
when your enemies will raise a palisade against you;
they will encircle you and hem you in on all sides.
They will smash you to the ground and your children within you,
and they will not leave one stone upon another within you
because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
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These pithy and bleak words from Jesus are spoken immediately after he mounts a donkey and begins riding into Jerusalem. He will not leave the city alive, at least until he’s raised from the dead.
According to Saint Luke, after the Lord issues this sweeping condemnation of Israel, he enters the Temple, where he brandishes a whip, chases out the moneychangers, turns their tables over, and cries out, “Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!”
The Lord was fed up with the corruption that ate away at his people. Even now, as he prepares to offer his life for them, they do not understand. Nearly all will abandon him before he gets to the Cross, even his own disciples.
But there’s one thing that’s worse than being abandoned.
The tears of Jesus are the tears of God when he sees the needless pain and suffering his people experience because they do not do his will.
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Some pain is unavoidable. Our bodies ache and age. We lose people we love. Even as Christ’s disciples, we must take up our cross and follow him.
But we heap unnecessary pain upon ourselves when we try living life ignorant of God’s will, spending our time on our own terms.
The Lord laments the fact that his own people did not know him. Just forty years after the death and resurrection of Jesus, the Temple will be destroyed by the Romans, never to be rebuilt. Many Jews will be killed, enslaved, or displaced.
A tragedy that could’ve been avoided, it seems, had they recognized, in Christ’s words, “the time of their visitation.”
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Imagine the Lord approaching our own nation, or town, or heart. Does he lament over what he sees? Or does he delight in our fidelity?
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While certain pain is unavoidable, our burdens are always lighter when we yoke them to Him, who has loved us and given himself for us.
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Image credits: (1) Sahil Bloom (2) If Thou Had’st Known, William Brassey Hole, Royal Scottish Academy of Art and Architecture (3) News and Views