Five-Day Devotional – Events Leading To Jesus Suffering – March 23-27
Monday: He Came For You
Luke 19:10 — “For the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” John 1:14 — “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.”
I am one of the angels of heaven. I have been in the presence of God since before your world existed. This week I want to take you on a journey through something I watched unfold — the life and mission of Jesus Christ. By the time Easter arrives on April 5th, my prayer is that you see it the way I saw it. Through my eyes. As the most breathtaking act of love the universe has ever witnessed. I need you to understand where He came from.The throne of God radiates a glory that has no comparison in your world. John described it — “And he that sat was to look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone: and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald.” (Revelation 4:3) Around it, seraphim with six wings cry out without ceasing — “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory.” (Isaiah 6:3) I have stood in that glory every moment of my existence. It has never dimmed. Not even slightly. Jesus — the Son of God — was at the center of all of it. Then one day He rose from His place and moved toward your world. And what happened next stopped every one of us. He became a baby.I need you to feel what that moment was like for us. We had only ever known Him as the fullness of God — the one whose voice shook creation into existence, whose glory filled every corner of heaven, before whom the most powerful beings in existence covered their faces. And now we watched that same God wrap Himself in human flesh. Fragile. Tiny. Dependent. Lying in a feeding trough in a cold stable while animals breathed around Him in the dark. The silence that fell over heaven was unlike anything I can describe. Then it broke — into the most overwhelming worship I have ever been part of. Because we understood in that moment something we had been straining to grasp. Peter wrote that we angels had been bending down from heaven trying to see what God was doing for you. (1 Peter 1:12) And when we saw Him in that manger we began to understand. This was a God who loved the people He created so completely that He was willing to become one of them — to enter their pain, their weakness, their world — to bring them home. We heard Isaiah’s words land with new weight — “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given.” (Isaiah 9:6) And the angel told Joseph — “thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:21) “For the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (Luke 19:10) He came for you. And heaven has never stopped worshipping Him for it. – Take a moment to worship God for this!
Tuesday: The People He Went Looking For
Luke 5:27 — “And he said unto him, Follow me.” Luke 5:32 — “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”
Yesterday I told you what it was like to watch the glory of heaven go still when Jesus left for your world. Today I want to take you with me to a moment that stopped every angel in heaven and filled us with a wonder we had never felt before. Some of my fellow angels carry one assignment — to guard the holiness of God. To stand as living barriers between His presence and anything impure. I have watched them at their post my entire existence. They are fierce. Unwavering. The weight of what they protect is beyond words. So when Jesus sat down to eat with sinners I watched those same angels lean forward and go completely silent. These were men and women whose lives were soaked through with sinand shame. Tax collectors who had betrayed their own families for money. People the entire community rejected and despised. People who had spent so long being told God wanted nothing to do with them that they had stopped looking for Him. And Jesus — the one those guardian angels spend eternity protecting — walked through a crowd, found one of them at his tax booth, and said “Follow me.” (Luke 5:27). And then He went to his house. I saw Jesus walk through that door, look around at every broken face in that room.and sit down. He ate with them, was present with them the way you are present with people you have waited a long time to be with.
The emotion that moved through us watching from heaven — it started as astonishment and it broke open into something I can only describe as the deepest worship I have ever felt. (1 Peter 1:12) Because in that room I saw the heart of God. The fulness of His love for His creation. Unashamed love for the very ones sinking in sin.
When the religious leaders challenged Him, Jesus said — “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5:32)
“For the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (Luke 19:10)
Heaven erupted in worship that night. And I challenge you to take a moment and worship God too. He came for the broken. He came for you.
Tomorrow I will tell you more of what I saw Jesus do.
Wednesday: He Set His Face
Luke 9:51 — “And it came to pass, when the time was come that he should be received up, he stedfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem.”
Yesterday I told you about the wonder that swept through heaven watching Jesus eat with sinners. Today I want to tell you what I felt the moment He turned toward Jerusalem. I was watching Him when it happened. He had been moving through towns and villages, touching people, healing them, seeking the ones no one else stopped for. And then something shifted. He paused. He looked toward Jerusalem. And everything in His face said He had made up His mind. Luke 9:51 says He steadfastly set His face toward Jerusalem. I did not fully understand in that moment what was waiting for Him there. But I could see the weight of it in Him. And I could see that the weight had not slowed Him. He turned toward it with a love so settled, so resolved, that all of us watching from heaven grew completely still. We had been straining to understand what God was doing since the moment He appeared in that manger. (1 Peter 1:12) And watching Him set His face toward Jerusalem something new opened up in me. This was not a love that faded when things became difficult. He looked toward everything ahead and He walked toward it — because the people He came for were on the other side of it. A worship rose in me in that moment that I still feel today. A gratitude so deep it had no bottom. Because I was watching the Creator of everything choose to press forward into suffering for the sake of the people He loved. Every person He had touched. Every outcast He had sat with. Every broken life He had stopped for. He was going to finish what He came to do for all of them. He was not going to leave a single one behind.
The seraphim around the throne kept pouring out their cry — “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.” (Isaiah 6:3) And those words rang through all of heaven with a richness I had never known before. We worshipped God together in that moment with everything we had. “For the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (Luke 19:10) He set His face toward Jerusalem. For you.
I can see that your heart is also being filled with worship and wonder at what our God has done for you. Just do what we do….. let it out! Worship Him right now! And tomorrow I will take you into that final week.
Thursday: The Week Everything Changed
Matthew 21:9 — “Hosanna to the Son of David: Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord; Hosanna in the highest.” Matthew 26:26-28 — “This is my body…this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.”
Yesterday I told you about watching Him set His face toward Jerusalem. Today I want to tell you what happened in my heart when He arrived.
He came in on a donkey and when I saw it my heart filled with awe — Zechariah had written centuries before “behold thy King cometh unto thee, lowly, and riding upon an ass.” (Zechariah 9:9) And here He was, the King of heaven entering His city with crowds crying “Hosanna to the Son of David, blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” (Matthew 21:9) The one we watched leave the throne room, born in a stable, seek the lost — riding in as their King. We worshipped God with everything we had.
Then He went to the temple. I remembered the holiness God had designed that place to carry — His people drawing near in sacred reverence, His presence filling that holy ground. I was grieved by what it had become — merchants and money changers turning it into a place of profit, worship drowned out by noise. When Jesus walked in I felt His righteous anger, and mine rose with Him. He overturned the tables, drove them out and declared — “My house shall be called the house of prayer.” (Matthew 21:13) He would have been justified to leave. Instead He cleared it — because He still wanted His people to have a place to come to His Father.
Then came the Passover meal. He took the bread, broke it and said — “This is my body which is given for you.” He lifted the cup — “This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.” (Matthew 26:26-28) I was overcome with worship. The meaning of every Passover lamb since that first night in Egypt became clear — each one pointing here, to this moment, to Him. He was going to die. His blood shed by sinful men. For them. For you.
All of heaven worshipped God as loud as we every had.
I am wondering what you must be feeling. I saw this from an angels perspective but you get to see from the human perspective. You are the ones He came to die for so your desire to worship Him must be greater than ours? One day we will worship Him together. But feel free to get started right now.
Friday: The Garden
Luke 22:42 — “Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.”
Yesterday we worshipped God with everything we had around the Passover meal. Today I want to tell you what happened in the hours that followed — and what I saw that I will never stop thinking about. When Jesus led His disciples out to the garden of GethsemaneI already knew what was moving through the darkness toward Him. I could see Judas. I watched him slip away from the group and go to the religious leaders, watched him lead a band of soldiers through the night toward that garden with torches and weapons. And I watched Jesus kneel down to pray. When I heard Him say “Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me” something rose up in me with a fierceness I had never felt before. I wanted the Father to say yes. I wanted heaven to open and call Him home. I wanted every soldier, every religious leader, every lying tongue and sinful hand moving toward that garden to be swept away in an instant. He had done nothing but love them and they were coming to destroy Him. And then I heard the rest of His prayer.“Nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.” I went numb.
In that moment I watched the heart of God made completely visible in human flesh. Jesus was not trapped. He was not a victim of what was closing in around Him. He saw it all and He chose to stay — kneeling in that garden in the dark, his sweat as great drops of blood falling to the ground, holding the weight of all of human sin on Himself and refusing to let it go.
Every word God had ever spoken from the garden of Eden forward broke open with new meaning in that moment. Every prophecy. Every sacrifice. Every promise of a redeemer. It had all been pointing here — to this man, on His knees, choosing you over His own comfort, His own safety, His own life.
This is what Gods love looks like for mankind.
What has this weeks devotional meant for you? Our goal has been to help you see God’s love for you in a new way and to worship Him everyday. May the coming Easter season be the best you have every experienced.