Agenda can be our biggest distraction. I can have an agenda to teach the Bible or write devotionals and because of my agenda miss meeting with the Living God. I can have a social agenda in the support of live, godly relationships, righteousness and more and in so doing miss people. And I can have such an agenda for the truth that I can even miss God.
The Pharisees had an agenda. It was to preserve the temple, protect the people, and fight for their nation. And like with any agenda it always seems justified and righteous. I’m sure the Pharisees felt like that and it’s only two millenia later that we come down hard on them. But agendas blind us all.
And yet here were the Pharisees, so blinded by an agenda that they did not even stop to consider that a man who had been dead 4 days, verified by many Jews, was raised to life. A dead man raised to life. How could anyone miss that one as showing that Jesus was not just a mere man? They could even talk to Lazarus which they did, talk to the people around them, talk to the family, and in the immediate present have all the facts and still miss the obvious.
I had that happen once. I was looking to study leaves in a book I had found to identify plants. I went outside and found a plant with a leaf and in my agenda to identify the plant, I thought it possibly could be several things. Then I took a step back and laughed. I had completely missed the obvious that it was a hibiscus. The bright flowers were right in my face but I missed it because I was so focused on trying to identify the leaf. I was blinded.
They were blinded.
But it’s one thing to be blinded by a leaf. It’s something entirely different to blinded to reality.
* The complexity of creation still baffles even the most scientific minds and yet people persist in atheism
* The man Jesus has risen from the dead yet people still do not look into his claims
* The same people who are don’t believe in God because he allows evil are the same people who disbelieve in God because he says he will indeed punish evil in hell.
We are living in days and times where agendas everywhere are strong and are blinding.
* Women’s sports are being destroyed in the name of being nice to all peoples
* A Chicken fast food restaurant isn’t tolerated in some places because it is deemed intolerant
* The people of God forget that Jesus attracted sinners to him
* Tribal politics stop conversations
* Blogs like this are now under censorship by G/gl and are no longer shown to anyone other than those who come here direct
When agendas persist, people don’t.
It’s what’s defining everything today. And not only are we missing reality. We are missing God in this reality.
Yes, God.
Agendas become so strong that we miss God in the picture.
We can justify it all. We can feel righteous in it all. We can feel like we are the protectors of truth and the only truly loving ones. The only ones who really “see” things and others just miss the obvious.
It’s what the Pharisees thought and felt and yet they missed Jesus.
They were so blinded by an agenda they missed Jesus.
A man dead 4 days was raised by Jesus and they didn’t see it.
Jesus himself was to raise in 3 days and they didn’t see it.
And that’s the worst of it all.
Agendas eclipse Jesus.
