Mark 14:53-65 Still in Egypt Land

Jesus is brought to the High priest's house, and apparently there's alot of room, because this was where charges were brought against Jesus.   The charges were false, and the testimony faulty, people didn't get their stories right.  The the high priest asks Jesus if he was the "Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?" (vs. 61)  Jesus answered "I AM.   And you will see the Son of Man seated in the place of power at God's right hand and coming on the clouds of heaven."

Everyone there (Priests, elders and teachers) proclaimed him guilty and spat on Jesus.  They also blindfolded him and beat him with their fists, mocked him, and the guards as they took Jesus away slapped him.    What anger and viciousness.

To them, Jesus proclaimed that he was the "I AM" the same title for God (Ex. 3:14), which is quite the statement for the religious leaders to hear, and Jesus knew that they would react like they did, just as he knew that they wouldn't let him go in any case.   The religious leaders were there to see Jesus punished one way or another.

Here is another instance were hard hearts were turned harder.    Where people were blinded by preconceived notions, and really by their unbelief.    Think about this, the Jewish people were waiting for the Messiah, the promised one, but did they even have faith that he would come?   These were the religious teachers and priests, they knew scripture, but they didn't put their faith in the message, or they were to blinded by their reality that they didn't make room for God to work the way He was going to work.  

How about the analogy of Moses taking the Israelites out of Egypt, and what would of happened if the people just resigned to be slaves, or they didn't want to go into the desert because they liked the life they had in the service of the Egyptians?   Basically over time there would no longer be Israelites, they would of blended into the Egyptian people.    Here we have Jesus coming to lead the people out of slavery to sin, to go into the promised land ... but they people are not willing to move out of their slavery to their past, because they see it as a threat to their way of life, to their understanding.   In fact the religious leadership is acting like the Pharaoh's of old.    Another possible reason why I think Jesus used Ex. 3:14.

The leaders were set in their ways, and wouldn't have the message that Jesus taught change them, or their way of doing things.  God became inconvenient.

How true about us though isn't it?  The Gospel message is inconvenient for us, it isn't easy, what it tells us isn't easy, what God wants us to do isn't easy.   But we exchange God's truth too many times for the lies of the world around us, and the false promises that it tells us.   Oh, that we would be open allowing God to shape us, and move in us.    It is my prayer that I would never become hard hearted that I would reject the I AM like the religious leadership did.