God the Father sent Jesus. Jesus knew the plan ahead of time. When the time came Jesus asked, Is there another way?
He wrestled with his father and then moved out in obedience. And he did some pretty stupid stuff.
Jesus did good to his enemies. He did not strike back. He did not go down fighting.
Spit upon. Nothing.
Beaten. Nothing.
Yelled at, mocked. Nothing.
Put on a cross to die, now he finally says something: Father, forgive them they do not know what they are doing.
Jesus died. Peter and the others thought it was game over. Nothing was accomplished. Evil won.
And then came Sunday. Jesus is alive. ALIVE?
Who saw that coming? No one. Certainly not the women who were coming to prepare his dead body for a proper burial. And not the disciples who were in hiding, pretty sure they were next on the enemy’s list.
Who saw the resurrection coming? Jesus did. He knew. Peter had no clue.
So now we are faced with our own cross, which we are told to take up and follow Jesus. We are told to love our enemies. Love them. Serve them. Feed, refresh them.
Loving our enemies seems stupid. But we are told to do things because they are what God wants us to do. What will that accomplish?
Two things:
#1 If we love Jesus we will do what he told us to do. Doing these stupid things reveals our love for Jesus. This is what we were created for. We are doing what we were created to do.
#2 I have no idea. I don’t. The disciples had no idea what Jesus’ death would accomplish. And it accomplished everything. Everything. So what will my obedience to Jesus accomplish? I have no idea.
But if we don’t live that way, if we don’t follow Jesus in these stupid things…then we don’t follow Jesus.