“Then Jesus asked them, “When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?” “Nothing,” they answered. 36 He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. 37 It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’[b]; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment.” 38 The disciples said, “See, Lord, here are two swords.” “That’s enough!” he replied.” Luke 22.35-38
The disciples missed the point. They took Jesus’ words about swords as a literal command. He was warning them that the season had changed. The days of traveling light and lacking nothing were over. A harder road was opening in front of them.
His quotation from Isaiah 53 makes the meaning plain. He himself would fulfill the prophet’s words and bring God’s plan to redeem humanity to its completion. He was the one “numbered with the transgressors,” though he never sinned. He sat that night among sinners—Judas already turning, Peter soon to fall—and then he went to the cross to bear the shame of all humanity. He was the hope of the people around that table. He is the hope for us today.
It is hard to believe it is already September. This weekend we celebrated my wife turning fifty. I have known her for thirty-one years. That still surprises me. The fact that I will be sixty in two and a half years is staggering. Yet as the season turns, I keep coming back to the goodness of God inside an ordinary life. I have a wonderful wife, children, and grandchildren. I have great parents, though Dad has passed, a sister, and sisters- and brothers-in-law. We have food, a home, cars, and good health. None of this is owed to me. It is favor.
In the same way, I have done nothing to be captured by the love and grace of God. Are the material blessings of life accident or gift? Are they only for my enjoyment, or given so that I might live and help others live? Christ stands in the middle of the question. His suffering, death, and resurrection secure abundant life now and eternal life to come—even for those who live in poverty, like some I saw last week in Zimbabwe. Many of them find joy in the small mercies of an ordinary day. Wealth in America looks nothing like life in most of the world, but hope does not come from what we have or do not have. Hope comes from God.
I sit and rest, remembering that God has placed me where I can be comfortable enough to look beyond myself. My work is to raise up leaders who will grow and bless the church, give God glory, and make the name of Jesus great. That is where this passage meets my life. The disciples wanted two swords. Jesus was offering himself. The season was changing, but he was still their provision. I am in a changing season too—another fall, another year, another reminder that ease is not the point. Faithfulness is. Gratitude is. Living the life God has designed, and holding loosely what I did not earn, is the key.
Because Jesus came, died, and rose, I can be confident in his love, his leading, and his grace. I thank him for a new season of fall, and for the hope that he walks with me every day, provides what I need, and lets me know his Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ.
O Lord God, these reflections may wander, but they keep returning to this: you are near. This designed life led me to know you and to give you my life forty years ago this summer. I am thankful for your goodness. The grace you give each day is enough. Thank you for loving me. Come now, Lord. Remind me of my place in your kingdom. Help me bear witness to you in everyone I see and meet. I love you, Lord, and praise your name. For you are good, and your love endures forever. Amen.