The Tuesday of Easter week is an interesting day: we’re almost at the point in the week when the major events happen, yet we’re close enough to the beginning for the shouts and songs of Palm Sunday to be easily called to mind.
Leaving the temple complex Jesus listens to His disciples discussing the spectacle of the surrounding buildings (Mark 13.1-2). Jesus tells them that “not one stone will be left on another. All will be torn down!”
Three of His disciples then ask for an explanation (v.3) and Jesus explains to them that, essentially, the destruction of the temple (that happened in A.D. 70) and the finale of life as we currently know it before He returns are both very much connected. One serves as a preview, a picture, or a type ¹ of the other (Matthew 24–25, Mark 13.1–37, Luke 21.5–36).
In a book titled ‘The Final Days of Jesus‘ we read this:
With this overview of the early events of Passion Week in mind, we have a good foundation for our closer look at Jesus’s final days. The stage is set for the final act. The characters are in place. Their goals, motives, and intentions are clear. The king has come for his kingdom and has issued a clear and direct challenge to the reigning structures of political, economic, and religious power. The drama can end in only one of two ways. Either Jesus will topple the reigning powers and establish his messianic kingdom—or he will be killed. No one at that time could possibly comprehend that in God’s mysterious plan, there was a third option.
Jesus has arrived to much Messianic expectation and He has set out His stall, so to speak (Matthew 21.18-19, 21.12-13) and now the events of Easter are poised and ready, the characters are in place, as we just read.
Tomorrow we will see plots against Jesus formed but for today consider how things must have felt on this day all those years ago: Jesus is here, there is a swell of Messianic expectation, and the Tuesday is almost the calm before the storm…the clouds are forming but the storm hasn’t started…everyone is here and everything is ready…the anticipation must have been palpable.
James Travis 