Thursday, September 11, 2025
Note to readers: This is an alternate reading from the Three Year Lectionary, and may not match up with the readings your church uses this Sunday.
John 12:20-24, 27-33 – Now among those who went up to worship at the feast were some Greeks. So these came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Philip went and told Andrew; Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. And Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. … Now is My soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save Me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify Your Name.” Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” The crowd that stood there and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to Him.” Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not Mine. Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to Myself.” He said this to show by what kind of death He was going to die.
Just think what it must have been like for Jesus. Here He is, teaching and healing and preaching among the people of Israel, as He’s been doing it for three long years—always moving steadily toward the cross. He knows His death is coming, He knows the details of it—that He will be betrayed by one of His own friends, that He will be rejected and abused and crucified in public shame. He knows that God will use His suffering to bring new life to billions of people, every one of them now a child of God, saved and blessed and healthy and joyful. He even knows that God will raise Him from the dead—and so Jesus Himself will live to see the harvest that comes from His death.
But first comes the pain. First Jesus must go through the fear, the grief, the loss. And Jesus is human. Of course He doesn’t want to die!
I think the Greek visitors must have been puzzled to see His reaction to their arrival. All they wanted was a little of His time. They didn’t know that their coming was the signal for Jesus’ passion to begin.
But it was. Because Jesus knows, and has always known, that the work of evangelizing the Gentiles belongs to His church. Jesus spent His short time mostly with the Jews, and rightly so, since God had given them promises that Jesus intended to keep. But now the first tiny wave of the Gentiles is here, and it’s time for the church to get started—which means Jesus must die. And it overwhelms Him.
I am glad to see Jesus being human. I am sorry for His pain, but so happy to see how much He loves us, and His Father—because never for a moment does He try to refuse the suffering. That’s how much He loves us. That’s how much He wants to see us safe and blessed and with Him forever.
WE PRAY: Lord, thank You for loving us so much. I love You. Amen.
This Daily Devotion was written by Dr. Kari Vo.
Reflection Questions: