A Life Lived Well

Today, is Palm Sunday, the day when, historically, the Church has spent some time remembering and reflecting on Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem. There are many different perspectives that one can take on that event. There’s the theme of coronation from Psalm 2: ‘As for me, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill.’ You can see Jesus’ arrival in the context of King David dancing before the ark of the Lord as it was carried into Jerusalem. Then there’s Jesus’ most interesting comment about the stones crying out. That’s more than poetic overstatement. Something cosmic is going on. Creation is also affected by what Jesus is going to do. But whatever else may be true of Jesus’ arrival, this certainly is: As Jesus rides into the city, it is clear to Him that by Friday He will be dead. We’re going to poke at that perspective and see what it has to teach us about how to live well.

So, please listen as I read our text, Luke 19.36-48.

Imagine yourself confronted with what Jesus knew. The doctor walks into your hospital room, and he tells you that the disease afflicting you is going to kill you, and it will do that soon. Many things go through a person’s mind at a time like that. One thing that many do is to look back over their lives and evaluate what happened. In effect, they try to answer the question: ‘How did I do? Did I do okay? Did I live well?’ I suspect this comes from a need to justify oneself. ‘I wasn’t a bad person. I did okay.’ I wonder if this is in unconscious preparation for meeting God. It needs to be said that for some the answer to this question isn’t comforting. In fact, for some it’s quite distressing.

Some hit this crisis before any doctor arrives with bad news. For a time this was quite the fad, with an appropriate label: mid-life crisis. For whatever reason, it became clear to those caught up in this that life wasn’t working and something had to be done. For some middle-aged men, the obvious solution was a new wife and a sportier car. But the question was the same: Has my life been worth living? Am I doing okay? And for these the answer was a clear and disturbing, ‘No’.

I’m not suggesting that Jesus had an existential crisis as He rode into Jerusalem. He wasn’t asking Himself any of these questions while He sat on that donkey. But that’s not because the question of a life lived well was unimportant to Him. Remember that He is truly human. That’s more than just that He has a body like ours. He also has a soul like ours, with all of its questions and issues, a soul that deals with life. If that’s hard to imagine, turn your thoughts to Jesus’ prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus’ very human soul was wrestling with the prospect of the Cross. So, you see, the questions of a life lived well were real for Jesus also. But Jesus has no crisis on Palm Sunday because He had dealt with those questions before. You see evidence of this throughout His life. That makes me think that He grappled with questions about a life worth living during the forty days in the wilderness. We tend to focus on the last section of that time when Satan tempted Him. But the days leading up to that were also important. They actually set up Satan’s temptations. Time alone in fasting and prayer is time spent dealing with God. Jesus’ time in the wilderness comes right after His baptism when He was called to and anointed for His ministry. Before He begins any of that, it’s forty days of prayer and meditation about the calling of God for His life. Those temptations are the climax to that time of preparation for ministry. That’s when Satan puts Jesus’ newly established convictions about His ministry to the test. So, the questions behind some existential crisis that He might have faced while entering Jerusalem have already been dealt with long before the events of this day unfold.

We do, however, see pointers in this text that help us understand how Jesus pursued a life lived well, how He was able to maintain the commitments that were established in the wilderness. It is these pointers that I want you to see. Let’s look at some of those now.

First, let’s consider the crowd. Imagine multitudes of excited people shouting praise to God because of you. Some pretty heady stuff. That’s what Jesus experienced. ‘Here comes Jesus, the King of Israel sent from God. Hosanna! Praises to God!’ Isn’t that what the crowd was shouting? But by the time that we get to Friday, it’s all changed. What is the crowd shouting then? ‘Crucify Him! Crucify Him!’ Some pretty terrifying stuff. But notice that Jesus is neither elated on Sunday nor despairing on Friday. It’s as if He doesn’t really listen to the crowds. Or better, He isn’t distracted by the crowds. So, here’s the first thing for you to notice. Jesus is aware of the power of others to distract from the goal. He knows Satan’s subtlety in using others, even friends, to draw Him away from the call of God. And so, He defends Himself against it.

How does He do that? An incident early in His ministry helps to explain this. Jesus is in Capernaum and has spent a very full day ministering to the people who live there. He taught, healed and cast out demons. And He made quite an impact. The whole town came to Jesus to be healed. Early the next morning, Peter and the others can’t find Jesus. They search for Him and find Him praying. They tell Him that everyone in Capernaum is waiting for Him. ‘Jesus, what happened yesterday was great. Let’s do it again. All the folk are ready. You should go back and pick up where you left off.’ And Jesus’ response? ‘Let us go elsewhere, into the surrounding villages, so that I can preach there too. For that is what I came out here to do.’ Notice two things. The first is that Jesus prayed. I find it fascinating to think that Jesus felt the need to pray. That is just amazing! But it was because He prayed that He was able to answer Peter and the others as He did. At the heart of His reply was a sense of purpose, a sense of calling. Jesus was called by the Father to a task. And so, He focused on accomplishing that task and not some other, however good that other might have seemed. Returning to Capernaum for another day of powerful ministry could have been justified. But if He stayed there He could not accomplish the task the Father set before Him. So, instead of being swayed by others, being distracted from His purpose, whether by crowds or even by friends like Peter, Jesus focused on God’s calling. Because of His prayer life, Jesus was able to avoid the distractions and pursue His calling. And out of that came a life lived well.

Let’s move on. Here’s another quality of Jesus’ life. It was filled with Scripture. We see one example of that in our text where Jesus said, ‘It is written, “My house shall be a house of prayer,” but you have made it a den of robbers.’ Time and time and time again, Jesus brings the Scriptures to bear. Even a quick read of the Gospels will prove this. A life filled with Scripture results in being able to see life in the way that we are supposed to see it; the way God originally intended us to see it. So, in our text, Jesus predicts the destruction of Jerusalem. How was He able to do that? Was it because of His Deity? No. Did He receive a vision? No. He could do that because He knew the Scriptures. He learned from them principles to apply to life. He knew that God’s patience was real but that it also has its limits. He knew the Old Testament pattern of calling for repentance and responding to persistent refusal with fierce judgment. He knew from the Scriptures that greater privilege for Israel meant greater responsibility and greater accountability. He knew these things and more from the Scriptures and made His prediction. A life filled with Scripture is able to see the world God’s way. Out of that comes the ability to understand how life works in God’s universe. And that leads to choices that are wise, choices that result in a life lived well. Jesus is the prime example of this. And if the Apostle John is to be believed, that is one reason Jesus came: to be an example for us to imitate.

One more quality from Jesus’ life. Consider again what Jesus is doing in our text. He is quietly and calming moving toward His death, a horrible, shameful and ugly death. The Cross looms, and on He rides. The Cross is part of what it means for Him to live well. Why did He do it? Or maybe better, how could He do it? Another text of Scripture will help here. ‘…looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.’ Jesus believed in joy – not wimpy, fleeting, teasing joy but true, lasting, overwhelmingly satisfying joy. The Father offered Him real joy, the joy of sitting at His right hand as Lord of all. The path to that joy included the Cross. No Cross, no joy. To be sure, Satan also offered a joy of lordship over all the nations. Remember how at the end of those pivotal forty days he showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time? ‘Jesus, if you will worship me, all this will be yours.’ This was a much easier route. There would be no Cross to deal with. Satan offered his brand of joy without the ugliness of the Cross. But Jesus knew that it was a lie. So, in the hope of true joy and full joy, Jesus rejected Satan’s offer. Instead, He entrusted Himself to the Father’s promise of joy. As a result, He rode into Jerusalem to die on a Cross with all its shame and suffering. So, here, we see in Jesus hope and faith and the desire for real joy, all of which had a role in His being able to live well.

Now, I went through all of that to get to this. At some point or other, you will be faced with this same sort of question: ‘Did I do okay? Did I live a life worth living? Did I live life well?’ At the very least, you will certainly face that kind of question when you stand before Jesus as He evaluates your life. It seems to me that it would wise for you to ask yourselves these questions before that time, kind of like preparing for the final exam. That’s one reason that Scriptures teach that there will be a final exam. ‘For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.’

How might someone answer our question, ‘Did I live life well?’ While the typical unbeliever might not think about Jesus evaluating his life, some do pose our question, at least in some form. Some of them do evaluate themselves. How might they answer? Some will say, ‘Well, I did good work for my employer. I raised decent kids. I was a good citizen and a good neighbor.’ And some might even add, ‘I was active in my church.’ Most unbelievers who tell themselves these sorts of things will consider those answers good enough. But I hope that it is clear that that we should not consider that kind of answer anywhere near good enough. Jesus expects more. We should expect more. So, what does a life lived well really look like? The Bible gives some clear principles. Here are some things that we are to aim at. ‘Seek first the kingdom of God.’ ‘Whatever you do, do all for the glory of God.’ Or translated: The goal of your life, big things and little things, is to make God look good. ‘Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.’ Those are just some of the principles that the Scriptures give us. They will look different in each of your lives because you are different people in different situations. But those are some of the basic principles all of you are to build your lives on. Remember the goal that you are aiming at. You want to be able to say to Jesus on that last day, ‘I chose this job, this budget, this house, this schedule as applications of those basic principles. I worked at living well as You modeled that.’

I’m guessing that some of you need to go back and review that line of thinking. I’m guessing that some of you have listened to the crowds and have been distracted as they have told you what they think a life lived well is about. It’s not too late to reconsider some of your choices. Keep clearly in mind that one day you will stand before Jesus who will ask these sorts of questions. He is going to evaluate your life. I know that Satan will try to blunt this by whispering something like, ‘Don’t worry about that. You’ll still make it into heaven. And that’s all that matters.’ Really? Jesus has much to say about how He will evaluate lives according to what people did and didn’t do. To be sure, doing all the right things will not save. But the lack of the things that He is looking for will at least raise the question of whether there really was saving faith. Jesus said, ‘Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.’ So, Paul wrote, ‘Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you? – unless indeed you fail to meet the test!’ Some of you need to consider these things.

I’m also guessing that others of you are working on these things. You know about the principles of Scripture. You want to base your life on them. You know that there are things in your life that need to be changed. And you’re working on it, but you have questions. You’re asking, ‘How do I pursue a life lived well? How do I do that for Jesus?’ Our text gives you an example to follow.

• Jesus had a sense of calling. The Father has also called you to some specific things. This is something that you can know, if you don’t already. You need a sense of calling.

• Jesus had a clear vision of joy, the kind of joy that you won’t find in this fallen world. It was a joy that He thought was worth suffering for. And just as in His case, this requires in you hope and faith.

• Jesus’ life was filled with Scripture. Your life needs to be likewise filled. That will take more than daily Bible reading. If you aren’t already, you probably need to be a part of a Bible study.

• And as your knowledge of the Word grows you will find yourself responding to the God who wrote it. As you begin to see life more from God’s perspective you will want to discuss it with Him. You will be praying just like Jesus prayed.

Follow Jesus. He is your example.

I want to spend one minute with you kids. You may not have thought about what it takes to pursue a life lived well. It’s a good question for you to consider. It applies to you when you tell yourself, ‘I want this college, that career and this kind of spouse’ or whatever might be on your list. Are you considering those choices based on what Jesus has to say about a life lived well, or do you want them because of what the crowds around you are saying? It’s not that college, a career or a spouse are somehow evil. They aren’t. My point is not about what you are choosing as much as it about why you make the choices that you do. And as you consider such things, do remember that one day Jesus will evaluate your life. He won’t be mean, but He will ask probing questions. He has expectations of you. He won’t be looking for perfection or even at how close to perfection you might have come. He will be looking at your heart and what your desires have been. Do you want to live well as He defines it? It is the right desires – and not the number of accomplishments – that He will reward. I think that it would be time well spent if you fathers discussed this with your children.

Just about everything that I’ve said boils down to two points. The first is simply this: live life well, as Jesus defines that. The second is that Jesus’ own life provides a model of the principles that are basic to such a life. You can follow Him in this because He has given you His Spirit.

John Piper wrote a book that he titled, Don’t Waste Your Life. Sadly, most Americans are doing exactly that. They are wasting their lives, settling for things like wimpy joy, passing pleasure, selfish desires. And at the end of their lives they find themselves with nothing, or worse than nothing. I don’t want that for any of you. A life lived well, an unwasted life, is one that honors Jesus. (That is always at the top of the list.) But Jesus returns the favor. A life lived well, a life that honors Jesus, is also a life that is worth living.