July 07 2025

Monday July 07

Christ’s Suffering Proves God’s Love

Luke 22:63-71

63 Now the men who held Jesus mocked Him and beat Him. 64 And having blindfolded Him, they struck Him on the face and asked Him, saying, "Prophesy! Who is the one who struck You?" 65 And many other things they blasphemously spoke against Him.

Welcome to Pastor's Chat today. It's hard to smile as we begin this chat, thinking about what took place this past Friday in Texas with the death of so many children and others as those devastating floods hit that state. First, let me just say I was raised in Texas. I was born in Dallas and lived my first ten years of life in Texas. All my cousins, aunts, and uncles on both my mother's and father's sides of the family, which were large families, dozens and dozens of cousins, aunts, and uncles, still live in Texas. It's a dear state. It's a wonderful place, and our hearts go out to those who have lost these precious, precious children and other loved ones that have died in this flood.

Now, I know we all ask that question: Why would a loving God allow anything like this to take place? The devil gets on our shoulder and gives us the wrong answers to that question and tells us God doesn't love us. God doesn't care. But that's the furthest thing from the truth. There are so many things we cannot understand. I can't understand when Jesus was born in Bethlehem, and after He and His parents fled to Egypt, Herod the Great went to the same area and killed all the male children up to the age of two years old, trying his best to make sure he killed the next potential king of Israel. It says that Rachel wailed; all the parents there, great wailing took place as this despot killed all these children (Matthew 2:16-18). I don't understand that this is allowed to take place and be associated with the birth of Jesus Christ coming to earth to save us from our sins, to give us eternal life.

As I sat in church on Sunday and thought about what has happened this weekend, I just wanted to cry. It affects us. I have four granddaughters who have been with us the last several days, and they're precious girls. I can't imagine losing one of them. And yet, with this tragedy in Texas, so many have been lost, and we wonder why this would happen. Well, let me just answer the question by saying we might not understand why. We might not understand why God would allow it, but I can tell you this: God has proven His love to us. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. Romans 5:8 reminds us of this: “But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.”

The passage before us today shows us what love God has given us through His Son, Jesus Christ. We're looking at the last nine verses of the 22nd chapter of Luke. Let's read these verses, starting with verse 63: Now the men who held Jesus mocked Him and beat Him. And having blindfolded Him, they struck Him on the face and asked Him, saying, "Prophesy, who is the one who struck you?" You can imagine this. Here's the Son of God. Here's the perfect Lamb of God. Here is a man who never sinned, neither was there any guile in His mouth. One who loved the people, cared for the children, healed the sick, raised the dead, gave sight to the blind, fed the hungry. Someone who laid down His life, came from the glories of heaven, became a human being, lived as a servant, washed His disciples' feet, and they're doing this to Him. They're mocking Him and saying, if you're the Son of God, you should know what my name is. They mocked Him asking “who struck you”, and many other things that we don't even know about.

They blasphemously spoke against Him. As soon as it was day, the elders of the people, both the chief priests and scribes, came together and led Him into their council, saying, (this is the third unfair trial of Jesus at this point) "If you are the Christ, tell us." But He said to them, "If I tell you, you'll by no means believe." He knew they weren't interested. They had already made up their minds. "And if I ask you, you'll by no means answer Me or let Me go. Hereafter, the Son of Man will sit at the right hand of the power of God."

Then they all said, "Are you then the Son of God?" So He said to them, "You rightly say that I am." Jesus claimed to be the Son of God. So when you hear these cults and others tell you Jesus never claimed to be the Son of God, they must be overlooking these verses. They said, "What further testimony do we need? For we've heard it ourselves from His own mouth.”

Jesus is the Son of God. God loves us. Christ died for us. He went through tremendous suffering because of His love for us. Don't ever question that. Yes, we can question why things happen we might not understand, but we can believe and be assured that God loves us today (John 3:16).

Let's believe this and let's be praying for these families that are going through this terrible tragedy in Texas.

God bless!