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Gospel: Luke 13: 31-35
Some Pharisees came to Jesus and said,
“Go away, leave this area because Herod wants to kill you.”
He replied, “Go and tell that fox,
‘Behold, I cast out demons and I perform healings today and tomorrow,
and on the third day I accomplish my purpose.
Yet I must continue on my way today, tomorrow, and the following day,
for it is impossible that a prophet should die
outside of Jerusalem.’
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you,
how many times I yearned to gather your children together
as a hen gathers her brood under her wings,
but you were unwilling!
Behold, your house will be abandoned.
But I tell you, you will not see me until the time comes when you say,
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
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There’s a small chapel located just outside the walls of Jerusalem designed in the shape of a teardrop, called Dominus Flevit.
Latin for, “Jesus wept.”
It marks the spot where today’s Gospel passage unfolded. As the Lord gazed upon the holy city of Jerusalem, he wept.
Jesus wept because he was rejected by his own people. He wept because Jerusalem, teeming with life, was void of faith in him. He wept because their city was on the verge of destruction.
And he wept because of his impending crucifixion, the fruit of political trickery, ignorance, and intimate betrayal.
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem,” he says, “how many times I yearned to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you were unwilling!”
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As he wept, Jesus left us with a rich image to ponder.
Just as a mother hen instinctively protects her children by hiding them under her wings, so the Lord came to shelter, to nourish, to feed, and to protect us from the snares of evil.
In spite of being rejected, those wings are still open to us today – not because we are worthy, but because we are his, no less than a baby chick belongs to its mother.
As the Lord says through the prophet Isaiah: “Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you.”
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All of this to say, there is nothing that you and I can ever do to make God stop loving us; it is simply not in his nature.
While we may not feel worthy of him at times, God’s wings of welcome are always spread open, leaving us a single question to ponder: Will we accept his love?
Yes, Jesus. Yes.
A thousand times, yes.
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Image credits: (1) iBelieve.com (2) GroupBibleStudy.com (3) QuoteFancy