Just a Moment

Today's passage:  Job 2:9-10

 "9 Then said his wife unto him, Dost thou still retain thine integrity?  curse God, and die.

10  But he said unto her, Thou speakest as one of the foolish women speaketh.  What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?  In all this did not Job sin with his lips."

     As hard as I tried to concentrate on Genesis this morning (and I did read it), a verse jumped out at me last night and it just won't let me go until I get my thoughts about it out.  Maybe after I've written about it for a bit, I can focus more on the passage I am supposed to be studying.
     In Bible study last night, we flipped briefly to these verses and something about them leaped off the page for me.  It was one of those lightbulb-I-never-saw-that-before moments.  Probably anyone reading this saw it a long time ago, but for me, it was brand new.  And when I see something like that, I just have to share (ask my husband--he's probably very glad I share with my blog now, cause I get over-the-top excited sometimes).
     Anyhoo, I have always given Mrs. Job a bad rap.  I think a lot of people have.  Here Job is, he has lost his fortune, he has lost his children (and his heirs, which would also mean the family name would disappear), and now his health.  He is mourning, he is itching, he is discouraged beyond anything I can imagine.  And is his wife any encouragement at all?  No.  She says something hateful.  She says something irrational.  I tend to forget that she lost a little too.  The Bible doesn't say anything at all about her health failing so she couldn't be suffering as much as Job, but take children away from a mother, and well, there is little else I can think of that would plunge her into despair.  She was grieving too.  Does that make her tirade acceptable?  No, it does not.  It might make her a little more sympathetic, but it doesn't make her the heroine.  Job was able to hold his tongue, why couldn't she?
     When I think of Mrs. Job, I think of this bitter woman with a pessimistic life outlook. Indeed, wouldn't Job have been better off without this negative woman?

Courtesy of http://breadsite.org

     Then I read his response.  What hit me is that he doesn't call her a foolish woman.  He says she is speaking like "foolish women" do.  That indicates to me that this was not characteristic of her.  She would not normally say such things.  Grief had overtaken her and in this moment, she said exactly what she thought. Now I realize that what is in our heart is what comes out of our mouth, but have we not all had moments where our hearts felt too empty?  Or too full?  I have said things in a moment that I wish I could take back.  In that one moment, she said something that maybe she wished she could take back too.  Maybe she didn't.  I have no way of knowing.  I just wonder how many times I have said something in a moment of weakness that might become my legacy.  Just one moment.  God chose to put these words in the Bible about Mrs. Job to help us understand some things.  Obviously there is the contrast between Job's reaction and his wife's.  But maybe too, it is to show us that even one moment in our lives may be the historical record by which we are judged.  Perhaps she was as bitter and pessimistic as I have always thought, or maybe, just maybe, she was overcome with her pain in one moment that the worst thing she could think or say came out.
     She lashed out at the only One who could ease her pain.  But before, I am too harsh, I might look at times in my own life, or times to come, that I might have been less than generous with my words, that I might let the sorrow rise and the unwise words hit their mark.  If God chose to record some of my less-than-stellar comments, it might have been only one moment in my life, but anyone who does not know me will judge my character by them.  Just as I have often judged Mrs. Job for hers.

 

Miserable Michal

Today's passage:  II  Samuel 6
   
     David's wife, Michal, did not have the advantage of reading many of the verses in Proverbs.  But I believe she had the examples of many women who had gone before her. I'm sure that those women told her how a wife ought to behave.  Solomon may have observed Michal's behavior, or many of his father's wives, years before God chose him to write these words.   He also had the experience of having numerous wives himself, and I'm guessing that probably a few of those thousand fell into these categories:

"A foolish woman is clamorous:  she is simple, and knoweth nothing."  Proverbs 9:13

"A jewel of gold in a swine's snout, so is a fair woman which is without discretion."  Proverbs 11:22 

  "A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband:  but she that maketh ashamed is as rottenness in his bones."  Proverbs 12:4 

"It is better to dwell in a corner of the housetop, than with a brawling woman in a wide house."  Proverbs 21:9

"It is better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and an angry woman."  Proverbs 19:19

"It is better to dwell in a the corner of the housetop, than with a brawling woman and in a wide house."  Proverbs 25:24

"A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike."  Proverbs 27:15

"For three things the earth is disquieted, and for four which it cannot bear:...For an odious woman when she is married..."  Proverbs 30:21, 23a

     Am I the only one who has ever been a Michal?  I hope I am not alone in this.  I hope, however, I am alone in how often I have been like her.  David's love for God is enthusiastic.  His love for God is sometimes uncontained.  The ark of God is about to arrive.  David's excitement is at fever pitch.  He starts to dance and sing with the people.  He is handing out bread, meat and wine by way of celebration.  He is so happy to finally have the ark of God back where it belongs.  Is it no wonder David is zealously celebrating?  He abandons his kingly robes in favor of being like one of the commoners.  This day, he is making a point that they are all alike.  And in God's eyes, they are.  He wants the people he rules over to understand that when it comes to Jehovah worship, they all come to God the same way.

David Celebrates Before the Ark--Taken from Treasures of the Bible
By Henry Davenport Northrop, D. D.
International Publishing Company, 1894

     Michal has been watching.  She is embarrassed and humiliated by David's behavior.  I think she may be a little jealous too.  For some reason, she can not join in his abandon.  She can not throw off her reserve and allow herself to be so free.  She wants to maintain control.  Always control.
     When David arrives home, had she greeted him differently, he might have swooped her up in his arms and swung her around, carrying her out into the street and dancing with her.  Instead, it is like being slapped in the face.  She reviles him.  She glares at him.  She rolls her eyes and sneers at what she deems a disgusting display.  Can you imagine his bewilderment?  Moments before, he was dancing and celebrating, at the height of worship, and in a few seconds he is plunged into ridicule.  Perhaps, this is why God allowed Saul to break his promise to David.  Perhaps, God knew that Michal would be a hindrance to David and allowed Saul to marry her off to that other fellow.  It was David's choice to go after her when he became king.  It was David's choice to have his servants fetch her.  I think God knew better.  David feels his bones rotting already.  How sad!  What was Michal's problem?  Because David did not worship God the way she felt it was to be done?  When did she ever give God worship anyhow?  And when did she become the expert on how worship should be demonstrated?
     I'm sorry to say, I have too often been like this contentious, brawling woman.  She did not have access to  the many verses in Proverbs that I have.  What is my excuse?  When did I become my husband's Holy Spirit?  When did I have divine revelation from God as to all things spiritual?  When did I become his mother?  I can read Michal's response to her husband and think, "If she would have just let him celebrate."  If she couldn't do so herself, let him have his moment.  Why do so many of us feel compelled to make our husband's do things in what we think is the right way?  And what is David's reaction to Michal?  Her behavior does not achieve the desired result.  I'm trying to think of any time that I have talked to my husband disrespectfully and it produced a closer walk in our marriage.  No, I may have gotten my way at times, but not without resistance or without eroding my husband's authority.  Why do I always feel I am right, and he is wrong?  I am always wrong when I am not submitting to him.  I have come a long way from our first years of marriage, when all I ever did was bark and expect him to follow my orders like a drill sergeant and his cadet.  But I have a very long way to go.  I'm sure the people nearby who heard Michal's derision of their king, rolled their eyes and thought, "Here she goes again."  How awful.  Michal was not earning respect as their queen.  She may have thought this attack would change the people's hearts towards their king, but she was diminishing respect for herself.
     Michal is exactly the wife men do not want to have.  Michal is exactly the woman I do not want to be.  She is that drip drip of rain.  She is the brawler whose voice echoes throughout the palace.  Who wants to be her?  Raising and waving my hand wildly here, "I don't, I don't."
     "Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of the LORD."  Proverbs 18:22

I Love to Know

Today's passage:  I Corinthians 8
     "...Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth.  And if any man think that he knoweth any thing, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know."
      I often say I am a fount of useless knowledge.  I know a little about a lot of things.  When I was younger, I may have come off as a know-it-all.  Maybe, even today, I still do.  What I have learned over the years, through God's love and help, is that knowing something doesn't mean a whole lot.  How that knowledge is applied is more important.  We call this wisdom.  But wisdom involves a whole lot of love.  Love for God, for His Word, for His direction.  How can I illustrate?
     My oldest son, who has mellowed a lot in recent years, was a handful to discipline from about 2 years to 5 years.  I was desperate for answers.  I thought I knew how to discipline.  I followed every Bible verse about sparing the rod and spoiling the child.  I couldn't understand why this boy was so incredibly stubborn.  Who would take spanking after spanking without relenting?  My husband and I were at a loss.  I grew tired of the advice to be consistent.  I was being consistent.  What was I doing wrong?  I read every Christian child rearing manual I could find, watched every DVD, listened to every audio CD on the subject, and I tried every method.  Nothing worked completely, but some things worked a little.  I wondered when the discipline would start "to take".  Then I came across some material that changed me.  What was my approach?  I was disciplining my child in knowledge, but was I disciplining him in love?  I thought I was.  I had failed to win this child's heart, and that was the key to unlocking how he behaved.  I confess, with all of his resistance, I started to become resentful of him.  I knew that was wrong, and I fought hard against it, but struggling hour after hour, where every thing was a fight, made it difficult not to feel this way.  I loved him, but I didn't like him very much, for a long time.  I started to make myself smile more, to ask him more sweetly, instead of ordering him, to keep my calm when handling the discipline.  I always started calmly, but after a half hour or so of still dealing with the same matter, I did lose my temper, on more than one occasion.  I cried myself to sleep, begging God for help when this happened. 

Courtesy of--http://breadsite.org

     As I changed my approach, I could see my son's behavior changing as well.  Now, I noticed that it bothered him more when he displeased me, something that didn't seem to make a bit of difference before.  Now, he succumbed to the correction quicker.  I am pleased to say that this approach has saved my relationship with my son.  It restored it.  I would never thought I could say that my oldest has a tender heart.  But he most definitely does.  I can't take all the credit.  God did a work in his heart and life as well when he accepted Christ.  I have no doubt that God allowed us to go through those trying times to hopefully be a help to others.  Nobody could give me the right advice, because it looked like I was doing everything right.  Nobody could see into my heart and see that I was doing it all wrong.  I was not disciplining my son from a place of love.  I was disciplining him from a place of power, authority, control.  These are not bad things by the way, but if not coupled with love,  they will get you nowhere.
     I had a lot of knowledge.  I had a lot of love.  But since I didn't apply this love to the knowledge I had, I nearly failed my son.  I'm thankful God was able to show me how to correct things, before it was too late.  I would hate to have not learned this lesson until his teenage years, and be unable to win him back.  Maybe somebody reading this has struggled the way I did.  You may know all the right things to do, but if you do not do them from a place of love, you will be unsuccessful.  I think I can safely say that carries into any part of our lives.

A Truly Tall Tale

Today's passage:  I Samuel 17:1-30
     Every villain has a story to tell.  Every bad guy has a reason for resorting to villainy.  I don't say this so that I can sympathize with wickedness or excuse evil, I just find it interesting to think about what motivates a person (besides our sin natures) to act the way they do.  Most people are motivated by something in their past history that determines their future actions.  I think if we forget that Goliath was an actual person, not just some story-book giant like the ogres and trolls in fairy-tales, he becomes one-dimensional and we forget that if he made different choices, his story would be much different.  A villain in a movie can only behave a certain way because that is how he was written.  He is not a real person.  Goliath was real, as real as David, and as real as Saul.  He was not just this fictional character to appear so that David could be the hero of the story.
     Remember when the Philistines carried the Ark of the Covenant back to their land after defeating the Israelites (see post: A Comedy of Errors)?  Remember the turmoil it caused among the people of the land?  I don't think it is a far stretch to imagine that Goliath had been a boy, although a rather large boy given that he was a giant, when the Ark arrived in the city of Gath.  This was the second city of the Ark of the Covenant tour.  Not too long after it arrived, all the people in the city (Goliath too?) became covered with these boils.  Itching, smelling, no relief boils.  Goliath probably runs to his mom and pleads with her to give him some relief.  She is helpless.  Herbs don't work.  Potions don't help.  Praying in the temples to their gods, bringing those gods offerings, scraping at these tumors, nothing seems to bring relief.  Goliath is miserable.  Perhaps he had even seen people die from this malady.  The men of the village conference together and determine that this is the fault of the Israelites' God.  The only way to appease this God they did not worship was to send that wretched box out of their town.  Let their fellow Philistines deal with it.  Goliath may have remembered the gold box being hoisted into an ox cart and disappearing down the dusty road towards Ekron.  Slowly, the boils start to scab over and heal.  Relief at last.  Goliath would remember this curse upon their city by Israel's God.  Instead of recognizing His power, he would let it fester and attempt to prove that the gods of his country were stronger.  He could have made a different choice.  He could have tried to find out more about this God he didn't understand.  He could have sought out an Israelite in a nearby town and asked questions.  But to do this would be to turn his back on everything he had been trained to believe.  It would mean he would have to not look at the Israelites as his enemy.  It would mean admitting that his family had been teaching him wrong all these years.  Not many people are willing to make that leap.  Not many people today are willing to look at their circumstances in that way, why should Goliath be any different?  Goliath resolved that one day, he would show the world that his people were the bravest, that his gods were the strongest.
     He must have been well on his way to proving this because the fourth verse of this chapter says that Goliath was a champion.  He was not just a giant, he was a warrior.  His height was intimidating, but his fighting record was more intimidating.  When he challenges Israel to fight him, day after day, it is more than wanting to show his might, it is to show that Israel's God is weak.  This is why he flings insults at them.  This is why he taunts them.  All the anger he has had is spewing forth like an erupting volcano.  This God who had made him, his family, and his townspeople so miserable so many years ago would be shown to be nothing.  Goliath hates Israel's God. 
     How do the Israelites respond to this rage that is hurled at them from across the valley?  Goliath was already a formidable figure, but standing on a mountain across the way, he must have resembled a stone monument.  His armor would have been blinding as it reflected the hot sun.  His booming voice would have shook the ground, causing pebbles to tumble down the mountain that the Israelites were encamped upon.  Every word Goliath spoke threatened to cause an avalanche on the Israelite hillside.  No wonder they were cowering.  It is not surprising that each time Goliath issued the challenge, Saul's soldiers went scrambling for cover.  Until young David arrives.  For days, Goliath had been seeking a fight.  For days, the Philistine giant enjoyed that nobody dared to fight him.  David has no knowledge of this.  He brings his soldier brothers food from home, oblivious as to why everyone seems to be running for their tents.  Maybe Goliath came out at the same time each day, and the Israelites had learned to run and hide before he appeared.  Perhaps David was surprised to feel the earth beneath him move until the voice from across the valley echoed in his ears.  The voice of one who hated David's God.  This was unacceptable to David.  Call them weaklings.  Call them cowards, but don't dare insult Jehovah.  David was not afraid because the moment Goliath claimed that Israel's God was worthless, David knew who would win the battle.  He knew that God would not stand for that kind of disrespect.  David had spent a lot of time with God.  His time in the fields was time spent with the Lord.  David understood God's nature.  And he knew that God would show Himself to be strong.  Saul's soldiers (including David's brothers) would have had a lot of down time.  Sure, there would be times of preparing artillery, making sure the arsenal was stocked, training for battle, but soldiers often have a lot of time to do nothing but wait.  This was time that many of those soldiers could have spent with God.  They could have been reading and memorizing God's Word.  They could have been praying.  And maybe some of them were.  But if some of them were, some of them should have realized that this giant was God's enemy and he could not win.  David could have spent his time in the fields napping.  He could have been lazy, he had a lazy type of job.  He also did a lot of waiting.  He spent it waiting on the Lord. 

David slaying Goliath--Taken from Religion in the Home (Part 4)
By Charlotte M. Yonge, Illustrated by Julius Schnorr Von Karolsfeld
Published by George W. Bertron, 1913

     How we spend our time is what will determine if we are victorious.  Aren't we all guilty of wasting time?  God has convicted me more and more of this.  If I'm going to slay any giants in my life, I need to be prepared.  I can't be prepared if I don't spend any time with God.  David did not go to the battlefield that day, expecting to fight any battles.  But God prepared him, because David allowed himself to be prepared.  I have no idea what God has in store for me today, but I should be prepared for anything.
     Goliath would laugh when he saw this man-child armed with only a slingshot prepared to do battle with him.  What Goliath did not know is that David had already fought some fierce battles protecting his sheep.  In David's mind, he was in the pasture, ready to defend his flock.  And just as Jehovah God had been with him then, He would be with him now.  Goliath thought he could challenge Israel's God and win, possibly because others had challenged Israel in recent years and won.  He thought he could make Israel's God look small, and with Saul as king, he might have won the battle.  Goliath didn't know that God had a secret weapon, and Goliath will fall.  Hard.  Goliath could have chosen to search out Israel's God, but instead he chose bitterness and resentment.  Those things would obstruct him from ever embracing the truth, they would lead to his demise, and they would label him as one of the world's most menacing villains.  Every villain has a story, some villains didn't have to be villains at all.

Uncivil War

Today's passage:  I Samuel 11:1-6
      Civil war is an oxymoron.  When is war ever civil?  Our own Civil War took more lives than in any other war our country had been involved.  Other nations' civil wars have been even bloodier by people less merciful.  I was directed to the book of Judges (specifically chapters 19-21), one of Israel's civil wars.  I think it is important to understand the events there, to really get a good grasp on what is happening here in Chapter 11.  Those chapters reveal a lot about the legacy of Benjamin's tribe, Saul's heritage.
     Judges 19 relates the story of a Levite whose concubine goes back to her village to visit family.  After an extended stay, the Levite goes to bring her back to his home. Each day he gets ready for the journey home, and each day the girl and her father convince him to stay yet another day.  This goes on for a week or so, until the Levite refuses, insisting they must get home.  They start their journey rather late in the day and stop in Jerusalem (at that time called Jebus), which was part of Benjamin's territory.  They are not offered anywhere to stay, prepared to sleep in the street, until an old farmer on his way home from the fields, knowing they will be unsafe, offers hospitality in his home.  The town is a wicked place.  As happens in Genesis, when Lot houses the two angels, the old farmer is prevailed upon by men of the town (Benjamites) to let them have their way with the gentleman and his servant.  I know a lot of people would say that the generation we live in is worse than any previous generation, but when I read the story here and in Genesis, I would have to say no. We are getting there, but I still don't believe our nation is as wicked as in Old Testament times.  Yet.  Or maybe I just haven't visited the places that are this evil.  I've admitted before, I am naive.  The old man gives them the Levite's concubine instead, and forgive the language but the passage says, "and they knew her, and abused her all the night until the morning".  Reading that, my heart aches for that poor woman.  Her heart is broken.  Her body is broken.  Her spirit is broken.  The Levite has to transport her home by donkey, and either she is dead on arrival, or she cannot revive to her former self.  I'm not clear on the details here, but the Levite then cuts her bone and flesh into twelve portions which he sends throughout the tribes, as evidence to what had taken place in Gibeah.  The other tribes are outraged.  Together, they make a plan of action to declare war on Benjamin's tribe.  Each tribe individually goes up against these men of Gibeah.  Many lives are lost.  Finally, the Benjamites are foiled and the other eleven tribes triumph.  But nobody really triumphs, especially in a war among your own.  Benjamin is given sanctions.  The other tribes refuse to allow them to marry from their women.  The Benjamites have no choice but to take wives from Jabesh-gilead (Manasseh's tribe who refused to help in the fighting).  This sets the scene for today's passage.
     The Ammonites live in the far eastern part of Palestine.  One of their own, Nahash, boldly sets up camp in Jabesh-gilead (just east of the Jordan River), those whose wives had been taken for the Benjamites to marry.  Saul himself, may have been a product of these marriages.  With this history between the tribes of Benjamin and Manasseh, either their relationship was very close, or very contentious.  The residents of Jabesh-gilead are willing to strike a deal with this Ammonite (or so it seems).  It would appear they did not have love for their new king, seeing as he is a Benjamite.   Maybe Nahash suspected this, and it is why he chose to go north of his own Ammon, hoping he might engage an ally against Israel's new king.  When the people of Jabesh-gilead pledge their allegiance to Nahash, he tells them their reward will be to have their right eyes plucked out.  What a deal!  Sign me up.  I guess the townspeople felt this was better than being torn from limb to limb.  But before they agree, they want a week to think about it.  They really want a week to enlist help from the other tribes.  For whom do they send?  King Saul and the tribe of Benjamin. 
     "And the Spirit of God came upon Saul when he heard those tidings, and his anger was kindled greatly."  People protesting war need to realize, that even God ordained it sometimes.  It was God's Spirit who had righteous anger towards these Ammonites who were threatening his people.  War is never civil, but it is sometimes necessary.  Easy for me to say, I don't have a son or daughter in Iraq or Afghanistan.  I never lost a father or uncle in Vietnam.  I never saw my brothers suffer flashbacks from the Gulf War.  I'm not saying it is easy.  I'm not saying it is desirable.  There are times when war is a definite match of good versus evil.  Our own Revolutionary War attained for us the liberty to worship freely.  The Civil War afforded the Civil Rights Movement in our country to establish that all men really are created equal.  World War I fought against absolute power by any one country, a time when missionaries were establishing the Lord's work throughout the world.  The results of World War II preserved God's people, the Jews.  Korea, Vietnam and today in Afghanistan and Iraq, were all fought to enable liberty for those peoples.  I cringe when people argue we should not be in those places.  Why is it our job?  Because we have the means to do it.  What other country in the world has the Light that we have?  What other nation has our resources?  Why should we surrender our men and women for these causes?  First of all, our men and women (my heart swells with pride when I write this) mostly volunteer.  They volunteer to defend our liberties, and they volunteer to help the downtrodden.  Second of all, war is always sacrificial.  We sacrifice our best, to keep the best.  It angers me when people try to take Scripture and say, "God is against war".  God sometimes instigated war.  In the passage in Judges, as each tribe is being demolished before the Benjamites, the remaining tribes go to the Lord and ask Him if they are supposed to go against their brother like this.  Each time, God says yes.  Am I saying every war is God's will?  No.  But every war has accomplished a purpose for God, in some fashion.  War is never civil.  It is never pretty.  It is never something to desire.  But it is sometimes the only way to achieve the work that God needs to do.  The remainder of this chapter I will continue tomorrow.  This post certainly took a turn different than what I had expected.  God's Hand is on Saul right now.  We will see how he will enable him to accomplish more for Him.

Glimpses of a Different Jesus

Today's passage:  Isaiah 63
     Remember that episode of "I Love Lucy" when Lucy is traveling abroad and helps stomp the grapes?  She makes it look so fun, that I just want to hop in and join her.  It seems like fun work.  Yet, it is work all the same.   If I am not mistaken, many vineyards still stomp their grapes.  Is this the best way?  Is it passed down tradition?  I don't know, I've never been to a winery.  From movies I've seen, it makes for a time of celebration.  Plucking the grapes, placing them in the winevat, and harvesting the juice.  It is a time to reflect on the care given to the vines while the grapes grew.  They sing, they laugh, they work.
     In this passage, the mood does not seem to be the same.  Christ is the one who has been stomping the grapes, and it is not comical as it was in the "I Love Lucy" episode.  It is not a great party of people that has gathered to watch Him.  He says He has trodden them down alone.  His garments are drenched in the juice from the grapes.  There was no singing, there was no laughter.  This is a picture of an angry Christ.  It is righteous anger.  It is anger towards those who rejected Him, not only as individuals, but as nations.  It is the picture of a Father protecting his children, a big brother battling the bullies who tormented His younger brother.  This is not the Christ I usually picture.  He is stomping the grapes with fury. 

Grapes--Taken from The Children's Friend (Part 2)
By Adelaide Bee Evans
Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1911, 1928

     Thinking about my Savior, I usually picture the gentle Christ.  The Jesus who invited the children into His lap.  The Jesus who accepted the ointment poured out from an alabaster box.  The Jesus who wept at Lazarus' tomb.  I avoid thinking about the Christ who overturned the money changers in the Temple, who called the Pharisees vipers and whited sepulchers, who told Peter to "Get thee hence, Satan".  That was not a gentle Jesus.  That was a Christ of judgement.
     This image of a Christ covered in the juice from the grapes is a bit disconcerting for me, I'll admit.  I don't like to change the peaceful picture of Jesus I have in my mind.  I know that people will deserve the judgement to come.  Does it need to be so harsh?  That is what my heart says.  Then I think about someone who might harm my children.  I would show no mercy.  I would struggle to be forgiving. I would wish for the cruelest punishment to befall those people and would gladly take it upon myself to carry it out.  When I think of it this way, the picture is not as disturbing.  Jesus will tread on all those who persecuted His children, on all those who blatantly rejected the cross.  He made the greatest sacrifice, and people, nations even,  threw it back at Him and said, "I don't want that."  Wow!  What gall!  What utter ingratitude! Is it so hard to see why Jesus comes in judgement? If they were my children, just like in the Lucy episode, I would want to join right in.