Are You A Dumb Disciple?

With Easter only being a few days away, it’s easy to listen in on the story where Jesus tells the disciples that soon He will be betrayed and suffer, be nailed to a cross and die, and after three days rise again, and think, “dumb disciples, why didn’t they ever get it? Why couldn’t they hear what He told them so plainly and not  just once but three times?”

Thinking about it, I’m not sure the disciples were dumb, or at least that I am any smarter than they were. There are lots of times when I switch off, I hear only what I want to hear, not what was being said. And there have also been quite a number of times that I’ve been speaking to congregations, especially ones where people are angry and frightened, and I’ve noticed that their capacity for hearing what’s being said, or seeing what’s going on can be zero. Truth can be spoken over and over and we just don’t seem to hear it. Strange!

So why did He tell them what was about to go down? I feel that somehow, later, they would recall His wo…