What if Jesus met expectations?
In the desert where the Tempter questioned
your identity, offering you a shortcut to glory
if you would just bow down and worship him,
You quoted Deuteronomy and stood Your ground,
but was it that easy?
Paradise Regained by John Milton portrays
the temptation as a one-side-event, in so as Satan,
a fallen son of God, faced the True Son of God,
offering You nothing more than what was already Yours,
but being the Second Adam, You didn’t budge,
succeeding where Man, where all men fail.
But Lord, was it that easy?
When the devil took You to a high mountain
and showed You all the kingdoms of the world and their glory,
saying, “All these things I will give You, if You fall down and worship me,”
was he not offering You a way to meet expectations?
In Judaism, the Davidic-Messianic expectations of a king
is divorced from the meek suffering servant in Isaiah.
Although Paradise Regained presents a desperate Satan
going all-in with his offer, maybe, just maybe,
the offer was a compromise:
Receive the glory and meet everyone’s expectations
But everyone remains bound to sin and separation from God.
As the good carpenter You were, Lord,
did your mind constantly drift towards Your future sacrifice?
Wood dust in the air, banging everywhere,
did You see the cross in every table and chair?
The shortcut was available again when You fed the five thousand
and they intended to make You king by force
yet You slipped away to a mountain alone.
If only they had known the bread You broke for them
was a symbol of Your body to be broken for them.
Blood splattering, flesh shattering, pharisees laughing,
Your ribs must have been exposed, splinters etching into Your back
as You painfully pulled Yourself on nails for every breath
to avoid asphyxiation. Every word weighed a thousand tons.
The offer was extended one final time when the pharisees mocked You, saying,
“Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days,
save thyself. If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross.”
Yet You stayed.
Broken.
Imagine if Jesus said, “I had enough! You people are not worthy of me!
I lived and die for you but you hate me because I do not meet your expectations?
Give me the crown and stay in your sins! You do not deserve my life!”
Broken.
Yet You stayed.
Today, I stand in awe of the choice You made,
the unimaginable weight You carried daily.
The offer was always on the table
to be what everyone expected You to be
but You chose to be what we need.