Sign up for Meridian’s Free Newsletter, please CLICK HERE

Jesus once told Mary at Cana that “Mine hour hath not yet come,” but now as we start this lesson that has changed as we take you to the beginning of the last week of His mortal life. Now he will say, “Mine hour hath come,” a statement that will break His followers hearts and have implications for every one of us.

You can also listen to the podcast at any of the platforms listed below by searching for Meridian Magazine—Come Follow Me podcast.

Maurine and Scot Proctor have spent extensive time in the Holy Land, researching the life of Christ. They have taught the New Testament in the Institute program for many years and have written books and numerous articles on the life of the Savior.

Join our study group and let’s delve into the scriptures in a way that is inspiring, expanding and joyful.

Transcript

Maurine

Jesus once told Mary at Cana that “Mine hour hath not yet come,” but now as we start this lesson that has changed as we take you to the beginning of the last week of His mortal life. Now he will say, “Mine hour hath come,” a statement that will break His followers hearts and have implications for every one of us.

Scot

Welcome to Meridian Magazine’s Come Follow Me Podcast. We’re Scot and Maurine Proctor and this week we study a lesson called “Behold, thy King Cometh” with pieces of the story in Matthew 21-23, Mark 11, Luke 19,20 and John 11.

We have heard from so many of you who have loved studying with us. Thank you for your kindness. Thank you for sharing this with your friends in your wards, in family gatherings, in social media. We are not marketing this podcast but by word of mouth, so you are really helping spread the word.

Maurine

You can find all the podcasts and the transcripts at ldsmag.com/podcast and you can listen on most podcast platforms by searching for Meridian Magazine-Come Follow Me. And if you aren’t reading Meridian Magazine every day at ldsmag.com, don’t miss out any more. We are updated daily with intriguing articles and breaking news of the Church from 100 writers. You can sign up for a free copy to come into your inbox at ldsmag.com/signup

Scot

Now for the setting of these moments from the Lord’s last week so you might envision it better, We will start a few days before when the Lord is passing through Jericho, a city right near the Dead Sea, which is the lowest point on earth. Jericho is about 15 miles from Jerusalem and about 3500 feet lower. Jerusalem is up on a hill.  

Maurine

In the Book of Mormon, when we hear Nephi referring to going “up” to Jerusalem, he is not meaning that they are going north. In our culture when we say “up”, we mean we are heading north. People in the United States would go up to Canada.  But for Nephi and for the people in Jesus’ world who walked everywhere they went, when you refer to going up to someplace, it is because it is uphill. You would you up to Jerusalem because it is uphill, sitting on a series of hills.

Scot

A Man Named Zacchaeus – Luke 19:3-10

In Luke 19: 3-10, Jesus is in Jericho, pressed by crowds and a man, named Zacchaeus, who is of a small stature climbs a sycamore tree to get a better view. What a wonderful detail to have survived 2000 years that someone climbed a tree to see Jesus better. Even more interesting, there is a giant sycamore still in Jericho with boughs towering 60 feet high that is purported to be the very tree. We can’t say that this is the very tree for sure, of course—it seems a stretch– but the tourism minister says that tests have shown this tree to be more than 2,000 years old. It keeps people coming there.

5 And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zacchæus, make haste, and come down; for to day I must abide at thy house.

6 And he made haste, and came down, and areceived him joyfully.

What immediately stands out in this story?

Maurine

It is that Jesus calls Zacchaeus by name. Pressed by crowds, Jesus sees Zacchaeus clear up in a tree and he knows his name, though apparently they had not met before. In the same way, what was the first word of this dispensation? Joseph Smith described seeing two personages and, “One of them spake unto me, calling me by name” (JS-History 1:17) The first word of this dispensation was Joseph’s own name.

God knows all of our names. Somehow that is so intimate and personal. If you saw Him, He would call you by name. He knows the name of every person in an unmarked grave.  He knows the names of every person lost in history to us. He knows the name of every person you pass on the street. He knows you and would say your name aloud to greet you.

Now when the people saw Jesus call to Zacchaeus, “they all murmured, saying, That he was gone to be a guest with a man that is a sinner.”

Scot

This harsh opinion was because Zacchaeus was a publican, which is a tax collector, and when you are collecting taxes for hated overseers like the Romans, you are hated too. But Jesus saw him differently. That’s what we are counting on, too. That he sees us differently.

Zacchaeus said, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.”

9 And Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house…

10 For the Son of man is come to seek and to asave that which was blost.

Maurine

This is an amazing declaration:  The Lord tells Zacchaeus that he and his household have received salvation—that’s like having his and his family’s calling and election made sure.  

And it matters so much to me that He sees us when we are up in a tree.

Scot

John 12: Mary anointing his feet

Now in John 12, we see Christ in Bethany, which is just over the hill from Jerusalem. It is six days before Passover. He will stay in Bethany with his friends, Mary, Martha and Lazarus, every night during that last week of his life.

Mary, sister of Martha, anointed His feet with a precious, costly spikenard oil that she had saved “against the day of [his] burying.” Judas Iscariot protested, saying, “Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor?” John explains that he said this, “not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag.” This meant he carried the money for the group. He was the treasurer.

Jesus answered, “Let her alone:… 

8 For the poor always ye have with you; but me ye have not always.

Already, there is heaviness in the air.

Maurine

Many of the people knew Jesus was there, and they came, not for Jesus’ sake only, but that they might see Lazarus also. Could it really be true that this man who had been dead, now lived?

10 ¶ But the chief priests consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death;

They wanted to bury the proof—which tells you how rocking to their world this miracle had been.

Jesus patiently told apostles, who could not understand, that He would submit Himself to be mocked, scourged, and spat upon. He would overcome the world, but not before it appeared to all those who loved Him that the world had overcome Him. They must face His humiliation before they saw His triumph.

He would suffer that others would not have to suffer, face agonies beyond description to do His Father’s will: ” For I have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak.” 

Scot

He had come from His Father, a messenger of love, and, having fulfilled all things, He would return to His Father. His prayer for His closest friends was that they could be one “as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, . . . that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.”

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, “The Grandeur of God,” October 2003, https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2003/10/the-grandeur-of-god?lang=eng

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland said, “Of the many magnificent purposes served in the life and ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ, one great aspect of that mission often goes uncelebrated. His followers did not understand it fully at the time, and many in modern Christianity do not grasp it now, but the Savior Himself spoke of it repeatedly and emphatically. It is the grand truth that in all that Jesus came to say and do, including and especially in His atoning suffering and sacrifice, He was showing us who and what God our Eternal Father is like, how completely devoted He is to His children in every age and nation. In word and in deed Jesus was trying to reveal and make personal to us the true nature of His Father, our Father in Heaven.

“He did this at least in part because then and now all of us need to know God more fully in order to love Him more deeply and obey Him more completely.”

Maurine

Jesus once told Mary at Cana that “Mine hour hath not yet come,” Now Jesus’ hour had come. Behind Him were the green hills of Galilee, the great crowds gathering on the grass to hear His word, the lap of waves on a blue sea. Ahead lay Jerusalem, the arrogant city on a hill, tense in its self-conceit, where already in their supreme blindness in the name of religious piety, plotters were scheming to kill the Lord Himself.

Offended by His healing touch, by His words that cut to the heart of their hypocrisy, the Roman and Jewish rulers gathered in the high halls of the chief priest and conspired against Him. Jesus’ final offense that had challenged their dominion was the raising of Lazarus. “If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on him,” they said. Raising the dead, healing the blind, lifting the broken heart, these were the offenses that kindled their anger and threatened their position.

Scot

Still, their fanatical hatred did not stop Jesus from coming to Jerusalem for Passover with the certain knowledge of what He would face. Bitter contempt, insult, and death waited for Him along the shadowed roads of Jerusalem, often from the very people who claimed they represented God. What superb irony!

Jesus said, “What shall I say? Father save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour.” 

Maurine

Triumphal Entry

Now was the time for His triumphal entry. See it with us in your mind’s eye. Jerusalem, is a walled city that sits on a hill. On the east, that hill dips down into what is called the Kidron Valley. This is not a wide valley like the Salt Lake Valley. We would think of it as merely a depression or a dip before another hill. You can walk across the Kidron Valley in ten or fifteen minutes. Then rises the Mount of Olives. From that mount you have an expansive view of Jerusalem.

On that Sunday in spring, Jesus and His band of followers were coming for Passover and walked from Bethany to the top of the Mount of Olives, where he could see the stunning walled city. The mount where the temple stood was larger than the Roman forum. The temple itself was known across the Middle East for its magnificence. When the morning sun glanced off its gold doors, it was almost blinding to the onlooker, standing on the Mount of Olives and looking across the Kidron to the city.

Scot

Jesus instructed two of His disciples to go into a village, where they would find a young colt. This would be the fulfillment of the prophecy in Zechariah 9:9.

“Rejoice greatly…O daughter of Jerusalem; behold, thy King cometh unto thee:  he is just, and having salvation; lowly and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt, the foal of an ass.”

On this meek animal He would ride down the Mount of Olives for His triumphal entry into Jerusalem, coming not as a proud king with conquests of war but rather in the rule of peace. 

At Passover the population of Jerusalem swelled, with Jews from across the Middle East returning to the temple to celebrate the feast.  The word of Jesus’ coming had spread among the festive pilgrims gathered in the city, especially among His own Galileans, who had heard of His miracles, and as the fire spread from heart to heart, they rushed out to meet Him, making a rough carpet by unloosing their cloaks and throwing them in His path. They spread palm branches for Jesus to ride on.

Maurine

Here was the promised Son of David, and now surely the kingdom was at hand! Waving palm leaves, they shouted hosannas: “Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord.” What does Hosanna mean? It is a word in Hebrew of both praise and pleading. It means “Please save us.” They were acknowledging Him as the Messiah.

The hosanna shout was included in the dedication of the Kirtland Temple, and is now a part of the dedication of all Latter-day Saint modern temples.

Scot

We have often thought of this joyous crowd, shouting Hosanna as Christ descended the Mount of Olives and wondered where they were later that week when Pilate presented Christ and Barabbas to the rowdy crowd and asked which of these should be spared crucifixion. “Barabbas,” they shouted. Where were all those who had cheered for Him at His triumphal entry? One thought is that these waving palms had been Galileans and other pilgrims who had come to the city for Passover and that those in the marketplace were plants of the chief priests who had been told what to say. Several voices can sway a timid multitude.

Maurine

Another thought, however, is that those shouting Hosanna on Sunday, simply melted into the crowd on Friday during this trial, fickle in their allegiance, shrinking before peer pressure. The cheers can be stopped in the throats of the fearful when all around them are shouting that Jesus should be crucified. What a mortal feels one day can be forgotten in another. Pressure, intimidation, and world weariness too often stop our righteous inclinations. We are so moved when we hear General Conference and become flat in our heart during the pressures of Tuesday.

C.S. Lewis in his fictional book The Screwtape Letters has a senior devil write this to a junior devil about the nature or mortals, who he calls their patients. He notes that the spirits of humans belong to the eternal world, but our bodies inhabit time. This senior devil said, “This means that while their spirit can be directed to an eternal object, their bodies, passions, and imaginations are in continual change, for as to be in time means to change. Their nearest approach to constancy, therefore, is undulation—the repeated return to a level from which they repeatedly fall back, a series of troughs and peaks. If you had watched your patient carefully you would have seen this undulation in every department of his life—his interest in his work, his affection for his friends, his physical appetites, all go oup and down. As long as he lives on earth periods of emotional and bodily richness and liveliness will alternate with periods of numbness and poverty.”  (Chapter 8 Screwtape Letters)

We don’t know where the crowd dissolved to by Friday, but on this Sunday as Christ entered Jerusalem it was a transcendent moment, and the people were joyously speaking the truth that here after all the centuries of waiting was their Messiah.

Scot

Disgruntled and knowing full well that the people were proclaiming Jesus the Messiah, the Pharisees made a desperate appeal to Him to stop the commotion. He answered that if the people held their peace, the very stones would cry out. Here is a hidden truth. It seems that all of creation would cry out to worship the creator if they had voices to do so. Only God’s own children vary.

From that hill, as Jesus caught sight of Jerusalem, that city of palaces and ivory towers, of terraces and magnificent gardens, He wept. Though the multitude cheered as He began His descent down the Mount of Olives, He moaned in deep lamentation.

“The contrast was, indeed, terrible between the Jerusalem that rose before Him in all its beauty, glory, and security, and the Jerusalem which He saw in vision . . . with the camp of the enemy around about it on every side.” 

For with God’s view, He saw that in A.D. 70, but a few years hence, the Romans would besiege the city until the temple would be left without one stone upon another, until the city would be tumbled to the ground, its former beauty in ashes.

Maurine

Scene after scene must have arisen before His eyes, the gory bodies of Jerusalem’s children among her ruins, the famine that drove mothers to snatch food from their infants, the thousands crucified outside the city walls. He said that in those days the daughters of Jerusalem would say, ” Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare.” “Then shall they . . . say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us” —all of this because they had rejected their God. 

Scot

Coming on the road from the Mount of Olives, Jesus would have entered Jerusalem through the eastern gate, what is also called the Golden Gate. The visitor to Jerusalem today would see that that gate is walled up and graves surround it. Jewish tradition held that the Messiah would some day enter Jerusalem through that gate. Though it is hard to document, the story is told that the gate was walled up by the Turks sometime between 1537 and 1541 to stop the Messiah from entering. Graves, too, which were considered ritually unclean were meant to block the way.

It is such an irony for any people to think they could block the Messiah’s entrance with bricks.

We think of that scripture: “As well might man stretch forth his puny arm to stop the Missouri river in its decreed course, or to turn it up stream, as to hinder the Almighty from pouring down knowledge from heaven upon the heads of the Latter-day Saints (Doctrine and Covenants 121:33).

As well might man stretch forth his puny arm and brick an entrance to stop the Messiah from returning to Jerusalem some day.

Maurine

Cleansing the Temple

As Christ entered the temple grounds this was the scene.

Pigeons and lambs were among the merchandise sold on the temple grounds. Former high priest Annas owned a temple market called the bazaars of the sons of Annas which stirred popular resentment.

The temple was a place of glory, with solid gold covering the great marble stones of the inner building. But it was also a place of ravenous wolves to the eye of the Lord as He walked through the outer Court of the Gentiles on that Passover week. Vendors haggled over prices on salt, oil, and wine used in the sacrifices, and everywhere the stench and filth of lowing cattle and bleating lambs assaulted the senses of those who came to worship. Money-changers used scales of questionable accuracy for the thriving exchange business of the Roman, Grecian, Egyptian, and Persian coins in common circulation, taking advantage of religious pilgrims. It was a noisy scene of desecration and bloated prices, dishonesty and dispute. As He had done once before at the beginning of His ministry, Jesus boldly went into the temple, overthrowing the tables of the money-changers, their coins scattering across the fouled floor, throwing out the buyers and sellers with indignation. “It is written,” He said, “my house is the house of prayer: but ye have made it a den of thieves.” 

Scot

When Jesus cleansed the temple, the public was not enraged, but the rulers were indignant at the loss to their income.

Because of the threats to His life, Jesus did not stay in Jerusalem but returned each evening of Passover week to Bethany. The next day on His way to the city, He hungered. Seeing a fig tree growing in the rocky soil, He went to pick its fruit but found nothing and cursed it. Why would he curse a fig tree? The fruit of a fig should appear with the leaves, and a tree like this, green and flaunting in its verdancy but absolutely barren, was the perfect symbol of a hypocrite, able to make a good show but to give nothing. “By their fruits ye shall know them,” the Lord had told them, leaving a haunting question by which all can judge their lives: “What are your fruits?”

Quoting from Mark 11

Jesus also used this tree to give his disciples a lesson in faith.  He cursed the fig tree one day, and the next morning the tree was dried up from the roots. Peter said, “Master, behold the fig tree which thou cursedst is withered away.

22 And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have afaith in God.

23 For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not adoubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.

Maurine

As it was with the fig tree, so it would be with all the self-righteous who make a false show of piety. It was the same with all those in Jerusalem who pored over the scriptures but did not know the Lord when he came.

What’s intriguing is that this fig tree was also the perfect symbol for the scribes and Pharisees who, as they always did, spent this last week in a show of righteousness while they plotted his death. Hypocrites each one. Evil often portrays itself as good. It proclaims it is virtue. It puts pressure on to conform to its demands.

In our day, secularity makes its own virtue claims and demands that everyone conform. If not, you are disdained, persecuted and called hateful. It is an old, old ruse.

Scot

More Mark 11—By What Authority?

In cleansing the temple, Jesus had upset the money-gouging bazaars of the chief priests and Sanhedrin. Merchants’ pockets had been lined by the temple trade, but so had the pockets of some Jewish rulers who were now even more infuriated. On the Monday night of Passover week, just a few hours after the temple cleansing, the chief priests, scribes, and elders consulted together how they might quell the popular acclaim that was attached to this Galilean rebel. For three years they had tried to ensnare Him with devious questions, all to no avail, but now they would raise a new issue. Perhaps they could show that He had no rabbinical authority and therefore no right to teach or even to speak. So, gathering together in all the intimidating power of their age and position, they made their formal challenge, saying, “Tell us, by what authority doest thou these things? or who is he that gave thee this authority?”

Maurine

Not to be trapped, He answered their question with a brilliant question of His own. “The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men?” Now it was the elders and scribes who were caught, for if they said, “Of heaven,” then they were admitting that John was sent of God, and his witness of Jesus was binding upon them. If, however, they said, “Of earth,” the multitude who loved John would rise up against them. They, who were supposed to know scriptural answers, could only mumble a humiliating reply—they could not say.

Denounced, humiliated, caught in their own pretensions, the elders’ hatred intensified into an emphatic decision—they would put Him to death. But for fear of an uproar from the people, they must do it with subtlety. Ironically, the Pharisees feared Jesus because they took Him as a prophet.

Scot

Now Palestine is a land dotted with olive vineyards, the gnarled trees with their dusty leaves lining the rocky hills and valleys. When the Lord refers to vineyards in scripture, he often describes the immense care he took of the vineyard. In ancient times these vineyards had a tower, so that servants could watch for thieves. Besides fencing his vineyard, gathering out stones, and planting the choicest vine, the Lord states that He “built a tower in the midst of it.” This is what a caring master would do for His vineyard.

Thus for part of His answer to the question of where he received his authority, Jesus told this parable, using images familiar to them all: “A certain man planted a vineyard, and let it forth to husbandmen, and went into a far country for a long time.” “And at the season he sent to the husbandmen a servant, that he might receive from the husbandmen of the fruit of the vineyard. And they caught him, and beat him, and sent him away empty.”

Maurine

The vineyard owner sent more servants, and the same happened to them; they were beaten, wounded, or killed. Finally, all his messengers having been shamefully treated, the owner sent his well-beloved and only son, saying, “They will reverence my son.”  But the greedy overseers of the vineyard treated the heir no better, killing him and casting him out of the vineyard.

Scot

The analogy was clear. The Lord had planted His people Israel on earth as His vineyard and then returned to heaven, sending His servants the prophets to labor in the vineyard and receive an accounting. But Israel too often had misused, mocked, and killed God’s messengers. Now the Lord had sent His own beloved Son, whose fate would be the same. The fruit of the vineyard would be evil and corrupt: “And it came to pass that the Lord of the vineyard wept, and said . . . What could I have done more for my vineyard?”

What shall the Lord do to these husbandmen who had killed His Son in the parable of the vineyard? If these elders and scribes wondered, Jesus had a ready answer, a scathing denunciation: “He will come and destroy these husbandmen, and will give the vineyard unto others.”

Jesus pronounces a series of woes upon the scribes and Pharisees. A woe is a grief, a trouble, a difficulty, a divine curse. This is because not only are they hypocrites, but as He said, “they have shut up the kingdom of heaven against men.” Instead of teaching doctrines that would lead God’s children to His kingdom, their teachings have led them far from the Lord. It’s a grievous thing to lead people away from God.

Maurine

Matthew 23—Let’s talk about some of those woes from Matthew 23.

14 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows’ houses, and for a pretence make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation.

How vivid is that. Devour widow’s houses while at the same time making a long prayer to appear righteous.  

Scot

Woe unto the blind guides, He said. What’s wrong with a blind guide? A blind guide cannot see where he is going and people who follow will also be led right into a wall. A blind guide may have corrosive ideas but a winning personality. He may be persuasive, convincing. He may be politically correct. Society may punish you for not following the dictates of blind guides, but the Lord said, “Woe unto them.”

23 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, ahypocrites! for ye pay btithe of mint and canise and cummin, and have domitted the weightier matters of the law, ejudgment, fmercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.

Maurine

Jesus is saying that they paid a great deal of attention to outward ordinances and actions that would make them appear righteous, but they were not as concerned with their devotion to God and the condition of their hearts. We do all the wrong things when we are too concerned about show. It is hard to choose well when how others regard us is the utmost thing on our mind.

Matthew 23

To understand the next scriptures, you have to understand the dress of the Pharisees. They wore phylacteries on their foreheads, which are black leather cube-shaped cases that contain a prescribed set of scriptures. They are still worn today by Jewish men at the morning service. One of the phylacteries is worn on the left arm facing the heart and the other on the forehead. They are a lovely reminder of the Lord, among today’s Jews, but, but the Lord said of the ancient Pharisees that they wore them as a show of piety while they ignored the most important things like caring for the downtrodden.

Scot

Jesus said in Matthew 23:

4 For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.

5 But all their works they do for to be seen of men: they amake broad their bphylacteries, and enlarge the cborders of their garments,

6 And love the auppermost rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues,

7 And greetings in the markets, and to be called of men, Rabbi, aRabbi.

11 But he that is agreatest among you shall be your bservant.

12 And whosoever shall aexalt himself shall be babased; and he that shall chumble himself shall be exalted.

Maurine

President Ucthdorf said that “in the late 18th century Catherine the Great of Russia announced she would tour the southern part of her empire along with several foreign ambassadors. The governor of the area, Grigory Potemkin, desperately wanted to impress these visitors. And so he went to remarkable lengths to showcase the country’s accomplishments.

“For part of the journey, Catherine floated down the Dnieper River, proudly pointing out to the ambassadors the thriving hamlets along the shore, filled with industrious and happy townspeople. There was only one problem: it was all for show. It is said that Potemkin had assembled pasteboard facades of shops and homes. He had even positioned busy-looking peasants to create the impression of a prosperous economy. Once the party disappeared around the bend of the river, Potemkin’s men packed up the fake village and rushed it downstream in preparation for Catherine’s next pass.

“Although modern historians have questioned the truthfulness of this story, the term ‘Potemkin village’ has entered the world’s vocabulary. It now refers to any attempt to make others believe we are better than we really are.

This effort of impression management is something we may be busy about, using up the very energy we could have devoted to real growth. When we want people to think we are smart, or special, or noteworthy, when we listen to the clamour of ego, instead of just buckling down and striving quietly and humbly to do the right thing, we are being tempted to the hypocrisy of the Pharisees.

Scot

Christ’s language is so vivid.

24 Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a acamel. In other words you are exacting at unimportant things and forget what matters. These are the same Pharisses who later this week will not enter Pilate’s house because it had unleavened bread in it, while they were conniving to murder the Lord Himself.

25 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of aextortion and bexcess.

26 Thou blind Pharisee, acleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.]

27 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto awhited bsepulchres, which indeed appear cbeautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all duncleanness.

Maurine

This was a perfect image for just outside the wall of the city, in the Kidron Valley were major tombs that were present in the Savior’s time and are still present today. It was not the custom to bury people within the city, so tombs surround the wall, including Zechariah’s and Absalom’s tombs and others that have beautiful white columns and look ornate and inviting, until you realize all they contain are dead men’s bones.

Jesus said,

28 Even so ye also outwardly appear arighteous unto men, but within ye are full of bhypocrisy and iniquity.

Scot

Elder Uchtdorf said, “The Church is not an automobile showroom—a place to put ourselves on display so that others can admire our spirituality, capacity, or prosperity. It is more like a service center, where vehicles in need of repair come for maintenance and rehabilitation.

“And are we not, all of us, in need of repair, maintenance, and rehabilitation?

“We come to church not to hide our problems but to heal them.”
Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf “On Being Genuine,” https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2015/04/on-being-genuine?lang=eng

Maurine

The days were barreling forward inevitably toward Jesus atonement and resurrection. He taught clearly In John 11

John 11:

24 … Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.

25 He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.

35 …Yet a little while is the light with you. Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you.

Scot

Still John comes to this inevitable conclusion:

37 ¶ But though he had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on him:

Think of the things that must be broken to live. The soil must be broken to yield wheat. The seed must be broken to grow plants. Our hearts must be broken to become new people. All things typify of Christ whose flesh was broken for our sakes.

[Matthew 22—Great commandment]

Maurine

Jesus was asked:

36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?

37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt alove the Lord thy God with all thy bheart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy cmind.

38 This is the first and great acommandment.

39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt alove thy neighbour as thyself.

40 On these two commandments hang all the alaw and the prophets.

Scot

To love with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your mind is to love entirely, to be single minded in your devotion to God which is so much different from the hypocrites who were all about surfaces. Jesus gave this kind of total devotion to His Father and to us.

Maurine

Thanks for joining us and to Paul Cardall for the music that starts and ends this podcast.

Next podcast will be “The Son of Man Shall Come” including Joseph Smith Matthew 1; Mark 12-13; and Luke 21.

Scot

See you then.