Rumors of Death and Betrayal:

First Jesus told us that one of us would betray him!  None of us knew what to make of that. Jesus had been saying many things that scared and confused us.  Only the other day he said he had to come to Jerusalem to be killed!  That very night Jesus would say:  “A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father”.  (John 16:16)   It made no sense, I didn’t understand!

Things had started to move so fast.  Sunday it seemed the whole city turned out to honor Jesus.  He was so popular.  And there was still so much that needed to be done.  Surely this was our destiny; to ride this wave of popularity and bring Christ’s teachings to every Jew?  How could he be talking of death and betrayal?  Yet there had been a number of rumors and threats lately.  The Jewish authorities were not happy with Jesus’ popularity.  We had had an increasing number of run ins with the Pharisees and Sadducees.  But things were bound to look better soon.  After Passover week was over and we got out of this city things would return to normal.

Perhaps Jesus was just tired, depressed.  For the first time that night I looked into his eyes.  What I saw startled me.  There was a chaos of emotions and a bottomless well of possibilities.  To say it unsettled me is an understatement.