The Problem Behind the Problem

The Problem Behind the Problem

Reset | Week 6

March 20, 2016 | Mike King

There’s a problem behind your problem.

John 11:39 (KJV)

…he stinketh…

John 11:45-50 (NIV)

Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him. But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin. “What are we accomplishing?” they asked. “Here is this man performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our temple and our nation.” Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, spoke up, “You know nothing at all! You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”

John 12:12-13 (NIV)

The next day the great crowd that had come for the festival heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting, “Hosanna!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Blessed is the king of Israel!”

John 12:17-19 (NIV)

Now the crowd that was with him when he called Lazarus from the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to spread the word. Many people, because they had heard that he had performed this sign, went out to meet him. So the Pharisees said to one another, “See, this is getting us nowhere. Look how the whole world has gone after him!”

They thought their deepest problem was the Romans.

Their deepest problem is that they were separated from God.

What’s really going on? Is there a problem behind the problem?

Are we part of the problem behind the problem?

Romans 5:8 (NIV)

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

We are all more broken than we can ever know, but we are more loved that we can ever imagine.