Read the passage and respond to these questions:
            1.  What is Jesus saying about who he is that you haven’t been getting?
            2.  What Kingdom truth in this text does Jesus want you to get today?
            3.  How will “getting it” impact your life in the next 2 hours?
“Jesus said to them, ‘The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men; and they will kill Him, and He will be raised on the third day.’ And they were deeply grieved” (Matthew 17:22-23 nas). They didn’t get it, but they were grieved.

They didn’t understand what Jesus meant. They couldn’t have imagined one of them, one of the twelve, would betray Jesus to the hostile religious leaders. They didn’t understand Jesus would suffer the cruelest death Rome imposed. They had no imaginings that Jesus was about to pay for the sins of the world on the cross and then in three days raise himself from the dead! But they were grieved. Whatever Jesus means, they have a feeling utopia is postponed.

I couldn’t sleep last Tuesday, so I turned on the TV and found Olympic Curling. I didn’t get it. One man, in the most exacting manner, slides a 44 lb. stone across a 146ft sheet of ice. Two more men furiously swish “brooms” resembling mops, back and forth. With feverish energy they sweep absolutely nothing on the ice from the ice, hoping to guide the stone to stop on a red spot called “the button.”  All the while the team of four men (the throwers take turns) are ferociously shouting directions and cheers to one another till the stone comes to a rest. Then the opposing team steps up to undo, or outdo, what had been done. If all that sounds terrifically bizarre, I concur. I didn’t get it. However, I watched Curling from 2:30 a.m. 4 a.m.!

The disciples must have watched Jesus’ lips moving with the same captivating interest and absolutely no clue what, with great intensity and gravity, he was saying to them. But they perceive that it was dystopian news for them; i.e. their ambitions were hitting the skids.
In the most exacting manner, Jesus is telling them what is happening. He is telling them who he is, and what the Messiah’s destiny truly is. It’s kingdom insight beyond their comprehension. Jesus gives them a preview to the turning point of all history:  his death and resurrection.  He’s going to take the Devil down. “They were deeply grieved.”
There is so much I don’t get. But I get that Jesus is the Christ; he died and rose from the dead. The disciples got it too . . . eventually.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, help me to understand what you are doing in history and in my life.  Unleash the transforming effect of your crucifixion and resurrection into my most sleepless moments, and let me rest in you.