No Greater Love

Passion for His Kingdom

No Greater Love

Going Deeper: Luke 13:31-35

Outline–

Lament for a Defiant People (v. 34)

Lament for Their Pathetic Choice (v. 35)

Driven by Divine Purpose (v. 31-33)

Listen to the Message here:  http://english.cccto.org/media.php?pageID=21

Discussion Questions

How do you love someone when they are living a life of defiance or rebellion (from you)?

Have you ever seen or experienced such love?  What does it do to the “Lover”?

What does this passage tell us about the spiritual life of the people of Jerusalem?

Why are the people of Jerusalem rejecting God’s message and killing His messengers?

What does Jesus’ double address, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem,” tell us about God’s heart for this defiant people?  Juxtapose this passages “but you were not willing” with Luke 19:41  “As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it and said, ‘If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace…’.”

How do Jesus’ words about his care and longing for Jerusalem express a high Christology?  How are we to understand this Christology as it is applied in verse 35 regarding his “presence” and the desolation of Jerusalem?   Contrast this with God’s statement in Jeremiah 12:7.

Jesus laments over their pathetic choice to disregard the Messiah. How are the people of Jerusalem left to suffer the consequences of their own choices?  What does Jesus mean, “your house will be left to you desolate”?

What will become of Jerusalem? See Luke 19:43-44

How is Jesus therefore driven by this divine purpose  in vs. 31-33?  What is the third way implicit in these verses?  What is Jesus set about to do?  What does this tell us about the Divine Lover?

How does v. 33 mark the goal or completion of Jesus’ ministry (purpose on earth)?

Discuss Phil 2 and its implications for Christmas.  What does it mean where it states that Jesus “emptied himself”?

In that Paul sets forth Jesus as our example of humility (in the Body of Christ), what are ways in which we too might “empty ourselves” for Him?  Discuss Dr. Kent Brantly’s example prior to his contracting Ebola as a possible example of this.