Luke 18:31-34
He took the twelve aside, and said to them, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all the things that are written through the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be completed. For he will be delivered up to the Gentiles, will be mocked, treated shamefully, and spit on. They will scourge and kill him. On the third day, he will rise again.”
They understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them, and they didn’t understand the things that were said.
It is good for us to take a careful look at the prophetic description of the sufferings that Jesus was about to go through. He carefully spreads the blame in a responsible manner to include both the Jews and the Gentiles. This has been a cruel misinterpretation in the past. It is true that the Jewish leaders turned Jesus over to the Gentiles, but it is also true that the Romans (The Gentile World Leaders) beat and crucified Him. It was a shared evil. Jesus also predicts his resurrection again here as well. It is important for us to realize who really turned Jesus over to be crucified. It was Jesus Himself. He did it knowing it was going to happen when He still had a choice to get away. He did it for us and it must make Him very sad to see us argue over who’s fault it was. He wants us to accept His gift and accept our own responsibility for our own sin.
Luke admits here that the disciples didn’t understand what Jesus was saying. In fact, Jesus knew that it was “hidden from them, and they didn’t understand.” I find this to be a pattern in life. God chooses to hide things from me until the appropriate time for them to be understood. Many people are going through difficult times in their lives today and they may not understand what is going on. This verse gives us hope because the disciples didn’t know what was going on when their Lord was cruelly destroyed right in front of them. All their hopes were crushed. Little did they know that they were about to experience the most world altering thing that would happen since creation. A man would defeat death itself. Perhaps God has a resurrection yet to perform in your life. Take heart, God may be hiding a good thing for a time, only to reveal it later.