We are now entering a period of time that the world at large knows nothing about and, if it did, would probably not care about it anyway!
Joseph and Mary went to Jerusalem every year at the Feast of the Passover (Luke 2:41) and Jesus, when He was 12 years old, “went up [with his parents] to Jerusalem according to the custom of the feast” (verse 42). As they were returning, Jesus’ parents couldn’t find Him (verse 45). When they went back to Jerusalem, “they found Him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions” (verse 46). When His parents asked Him about His whereabouts, He said to them, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” (verse 49).
Here was the Messiah, as a young boy, being about His Father’s business. At this same time of the year, but nearly 2,000 years later, can we say the same about our activities? The world has no concept about the true meaning of the Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread. They may seem foolishness to it, because we need spiritual understanding and discernment to comprehend their importance (compare 1 Corinthians 2:14). The world is guided and directed by “the prince of the power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2), who “has blinded” the minds of those not being called at this time (2 Corinthians 4:4). As a consequence, the world is doing its own thing.
We must be different! And as we take the Passover on Friday evening,18th April, as required annually at this time of the year, and as we celebrate the Night To Be Much Observed the following evening (on April 19) and the seven Days of Unleavened Bread (from April 20 until and including April 26), we can be truly thankful for the unique and marvelous calling that God has given us–a calling that sets us apart from the world and its ways.
We must never take our calling lightly, and we should truly rejoice in the knowledge and understanding that God has graciously granted to us, as we go “about our Father’s business.”
