"the Fox And The Hen"

“The Fox and the Hen”

Luke 13:31-35

What just happened?

Were the Pharisees—that is the religious leaders--really concerned about Jesus?

They warned Jesus that Herod wanted to kill Him.

Why would they do that?

Not only did they not like Jesus; they had been discussing among themselves what they wanted to do to Him for quite some time.

In their opinion, Jesus paid no attention to the Law, and their main mission was to keep the Law as fully as possible.

When Jesus healed a paralytic in Luke Chapter 5, the Pharisees were furious.

When Jesus, on a Sabbath day, healed a man who had a withered hand, in Luke Chapter 6, the Pharisees were ready to pull their hair out.

In Luke Chapter 11, Jesus really laid into the Pharisees hard for being more concerned with the rule of Law than with people.

His defiance of the Law of the Pharisees made Jesus PUBLIC ENEMY NUMBER 1!

We are told in Luke Chapter 11:54 that the Pharisees along with the scribes started to lie in wait to catch Jesus saying or doing something wrong.

So, given Jesus’ troubled history with the Pharisees, and the fact that they would be the ones behind His eventual Crucifixion, why do they appear to be so concerned for His safety???

“Leave this place and go somewhere else,” they warn, “Herod wants to kill you.”

It has been suggested that the warning from the Pharisees is actually a political strategy of Herod.

In other words, the Pharisees and Herod are in cahoots, and they want to drive Jesus out of Herod’s jurisdiction and right into the arms of Pilate and make Him Pilate’s responsibility!

Maybe Pilate can figure out a way of getting rid of Jesus altogether!

Of course, Jesus sees right through the Pharisees “so-called” good intentions.

And He proves it by linking them together with Herod: “Go tell that fox, ‘I will drive out demons and heal people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will reach my goal.’”

Jesus knew that in order to fulfill the will of God, He could not veer away from the path that was set out for Him.

He had to go to Jerusalem to suffer and die—rising again on the third day!!!

In the final weeks of His life, Jesus is moving closer and closer to Jerusalem—the city of David—where so many of the great prophets from the past have been ignored, hated, killed.

Jesus was on His way to this same fate and He knew it well.

And still, He went.

He went because He loves you, He went because He loves me, He went because He loved the Pharisees and even that “Fox” Herod!

A father tells of a situation with his daughter, Sarah, who is sixteen years old.

One night, Sarah is about to leave the house on a date with her older boyfriend.

The father has been worrying about Sarah.

She has been acting out, and is starting to do poorly in school.

He would do anything to protect her, to keep her safe and make sure she makes the most of the life God has given her.

Then, a car is honking its horn out front.

Sarah’s father is slumped down in his chair, exhausted from a fourteen-hour day.

Before Sarah steps through the screen door, her father says: “Remember—curfew is at 12 O’clock!”

His daughter stops at the far end of the living room, turns, and says with an expression that is half sneer, half smile: “I’d like to see you make me get home by twelve!”

The screen door slams behind her and the father knows she is right.

He is powerless to make her do much of anything anymore.

One of our greatest images of Jesus is that He can do ANYTHING!

He can walk on water.

He can turn a couple fish and a few loaves of bread into a feast for thousands.

He can even raise the dead.

Yes, Jesus can do anything!

But one thing Jesus will not do is to make us love Him.

Jesus will not control human will.

And so, in our Gospel Lesson for this morning, we see Jesus give one of His most emotional utterances recorded in the Bible: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!”

Jesus will walk out of a tomb on Easter morning, but He won’t walk into our hearts without permission!

I would imagine anyone who has loved someone deeply and knows that they can’t shelter them from harm’s way understands just a little bit of the pain in Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem.