We don’t have to be vicars or ministers, or need a doctorate in Divinity, to realise that when God’s Son came to earth it was all part and parcel of a preordained plan (Ephesians 1:11).
It was a mission that started off gloriously but its apparent failure was only underlined by the words spoken by a dying Jesus on the Cross when He cried out:
‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing’.
What had started so wonderfully well appeared to end disastrously. So we ask…
- Why didn’t the Jews respond to Jesus as their Messiah?
- Why did they fail to recognise Him as their king?
- Why did they crucify Him?
- Why did they not know what they were doing?
- Did Jesus get it wrong?
To answer such questions as these and to understand God’s amazing plan, we need to go back in time and seek to understand just what the Jews expected of their Messiah when He came.