Have you ever noticed that the best plans sometimes don’t work out the way things were planned! The Olympic games opening ceremonies almost never go off without a hitch. All the hard work and planning can’t protect against error or just malfunction. Things just don’t work sometimes. Even the launching of spacecraft can go wrong. Hundreds of millions of dollars can blow up, or just fail to get all the way up for no known reason.
We read about the religious leaders planning to kill Jesus. Shouldn’t that have sparked something of a contradiction in them, religious leader and killing? Shouldn’t their conscience stop them? Did any of them speak up, or did peer pressure get to them. We know that some in this group become Jesus-followers. Where was their voice before the fateful act?
Notice their plan is to get Jesus killed. But they don’t want it to happen when everyone is around during the Passover festival. That would bring too much publicity. It would carry with it increase risk of something going wrong, of things getting out of hand.
Things haven’t changed much. Politicians these days seem to do what they want, even when it isn’t what the people want. If all the money spent to put Obamacare into effect had been spent on healthcare instead of bureaucracy, everyone would have care. Instead we have tens of thousands of regulations and the same number of uninsured people. We are employing government workers who have a vested interest in making sure it takes a long time to get things done. Their jobs depend on it taking a long time. If it is done efficiently, they work themselves out of a job. And they don’t want that.
The religious leaders of Jesus’ day had political influence. They weren’t actually in charge, but they had the ear of those who were. They wanted to avoid the publicity. They wanted to keep it on the down low. They DIDN’T want it to happen during the Passover, but that is exactly what happened.
So how did it happen? They let their own ambition get the better of them. Judas gave them a window of opportunity that they just couldn’t resist. They lacked the self-discipline to wait patiently until after the Passover. All they had to do was wait a few weeks, and all would be good. But they just couldn’t help themselves. They tasted their prize, and they went for it.
Have you ever jumped to a decision only to regret it later? I know I have. I call it “jumping to a concussion!” Many people jump to a conclusion too early. They make a decision in the heat of the moment, only to gather more facts later that make their decision somewhat silly.
Practice patience with decisions. Don’t jump.
The Arnold Journey 