What is your attention on?

Make sure you embrace all the facts.

“When they came together in Galilee, he said to them, “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men. They will kill him, and on the third day he will be raised to life.” And the disciples were filled with grief.” (Matthew 17 v 22-23)

This is the second time that Jesus tells his disciples what is going to happen to him.

They are filled with grief.

Why?

It seems they are grieving only because they have heard the first part of what will happen to him.

Perhaps they are grieving because of how this will affect them. After all they were hoping Jesus would overthrow the Roman oppression and bring about a new day.

But then maybe there is some development here because the first time (Matthew 16) the reaction was that they would never let Jesus die. So at least it could be said they have progressed to fatalism!

Whatever the reason they are grieving because they haven’t understood resurrection.

How often we look at what is happening in the moment and fail to step back to see that God is actually bigger in our life than we realise. The Friday is a dark day but Sunday will follow soon. We have valleys of shadows of death but there are streams of quiet waters also. Thankfully the disciple’s lack of response to the resurrection of Jesus didn’t impact on it happening. God made it happen and He will keep on producing the good in our lives even from bad situations regardless whether we grieve and cannot see His hand or whether we embrace the sufferings realising there is purpose and hope within them.

So if you wake to a bad day and your situation isn’t what you wanted then take a deep breath, wait, don’t kick back, don’t fall to pieces, remember God is mightier than your bad day. He is above this. He carries resurrection power. Focus on this and you will make it through.