1 Kings 20
12 Meanwhile, Benhadad and the other kings had been drinking in their tents. But when Ahab’s reply came, he ordered his soldiers to prepare to attack Samaria, and they all got ready.
13 At that very moment, a prophet ran up to Ahab and said, “You can see that Benhadad’s army is very strong. But the Lord has promised to help you defeat them today. Then you will know that the Lord is in control.”
14 “Who will fight the battle?” Ahab asked.
The prophet answered, “The young bodyguards who serve the district officials.”
“But who will lead them into battle?” Ahab asked.
“You will!” the prophet replied.
15 So Ahab called together the two hundred thirty-two young soldiers and the seven thousand troops in Israel’s army, and he got them ready to fight the Syrians.
Richard: Notice here that a small vanguard of bodyguards leads the troops, who are in turn led be Ahab, who was not confident that he could lead the troops.
Mark 12
13 The Pharisees got together with Herod’s followers.[a] Then they sent some men to trick Jesus into saying something wrong. 14 They went to him and said, “Teacher, we know that you are honest. You treat everyone with the same respect, no matter who they are. And you teach the truth about what God wants people to do. Tell us, should we pay taxes to the Emperor or not?”
15 Jesus knew what they were up to, and he said, “Why are you trying to test me? Show me a coin!”
16 They brought him a silver coin, and he asked, “Whose picture and name are on it?”
“The Emperor’s,” they answered.
17 Then Jesus told them, “Give the Emperor what belongs to him and give God what belongs to God.” The men were amazed at Jesus.
Jesus Whom God Wanted To Find
Rev. Sun Myung Moon
October 18, 1959
The short speech that I want to give today is on the topic of “Jesus Whom God Wanted to Find.”
We know that Jesus is the only begotten son of God. God wanted to find Jesus for four thousand years. God found Jesus after the Israelites went through all kinds of conditions of hard work. Jesus was a person who worked hard to fulfill the will of God and the will of the people who wanted to attend him. Thus, the fate of Heaven, the historic fate of the chosen people of Israel, the fate of the age and the fate of the future were all entangled centering on Jesus. When God found Jesus, His purpose for choosing Israel was to be fulfilled. When God embraced Jesus completely, He was embracing the chosen people of Israel. When God could dwell joyously with Jesus, He could dwell with the people of Israel. It was the work of God to find Jesus in total fulfillment. Moreover, attending Jesus completely is the hope of the fallen descendants and of mankind, who are anticipating salvation.
To find Jesus Heaven went through all kinds of hardships from after the Fall until his arrival. In order to attend this one man, the chosen people went through a road of unspeakable persecution and the road of death in their historic course. They repeated numerous times the history of struggle where they fell down, stood up, stood up and fell down, and stood up again. This historical sorrow of the chosen people of Israel would have been removed by their clinging to Jesus. The sorrow of God, who had suffered to send Jesus, also would have been removed.
Jesus did come. Jesus came to this land and worked hard. Jesus fought for us in this land. He endured and fought for Heaven. He even went the road of death alone. Jesus actually did come for the age and the future.
But he is in a position of not having removed the sorrow of history and not having removed the sorrow of the age. For that reason today, two thousand years after Jesus’ coming, he has to come again. This age needs Jesus to come again. The future also needs Jesus.
When we think of this, how much would God have longed to see Jesus as a person who had completed God’s hope? How much would Jesus have wanted to stand in a position representing the dignity of Heaven on the one hand and the dignity of earth on the other? But Jesus never got to establish that dignity in its totality.
Jesus, having appeared to his people, probably longed to reign as King of Kings, the governor of all people and the crown prince of Heaven. Even if that did not happen, the Israelites, who had been prepared for four thousand years, should not have abandoned him, even at the risk of their lives. He would not have let go of the Israelites even at the point of death. But with death at hand, they divided and separated. Thus, he disappeared from the people, and he was in a situation where he had to depart from this earth. We should know this clearly. Jesus was filled with a sense of his historic mission and a sense of the mission to the age. Moreover, he was filled with a heart of wanting to save mankind, who were crying out as they were swept away by the wave of death. Was there a person who attended this Jesus, the Messiah, the only begotten son of God? There was no one.
If there is something that Heaven looked for from Jesus, what would that have been? If there was something that Heaven wanted to find, it would have been someone who knew Jesus. The person who truly knows him is a person who knows God. The person who knows God knows him. The Israelites, who considered that they knew God, were supposed to attend Jesus. But mankind lost Jesus. Heaven lost him, and he had to die, leaving his mission behind on this earth. We should recognize this fact again.