Jesus was Just Lucky

Tonight Show host Johnny Carson used to keep an old embroidered cushion on the sofa in his office. It bore the slogan: "Timing is everything." Timing is important to comedy. It’s also necessary for miracles. Just consider this:

Acts 2 is famous for its narration of the Day of Pentecost and the coming of the Spirit. No doubt, it's fascinating to imagine those tongues of fire appearing as Galilean disciples suddenly speak in languages they’ve never learned. It’s exciting to envision Peter preaching to listeners from places like Parthia, Pamphylia, Egypt and Rome and seeing 3,000 converted. But have you ever wondered why all those mobs of listeners were visiting Jerusalem in the first place?

For nearly two thousand years, since the days of Moses, the Israelites had observed several feasts and festivals established at Mount Sinai by God Almighty. Without really understanding it, each year when people of faith took part in those ancient rituals, they were not simply looking to the past, but to the future. They were participating in events which would ultimately be fulfilled by the arrival of the long promised Messiah.

So Passover packed the streets of Jerusalem with men and women deeply familiar with the Old Testament. And during the final year of Christ’s ministry, all those crowds arrived to see Isaiah 53 fulfilled in the death and resurrection of Christ. They saw with their own eyes the actual Passover Lamb slain for the sins of the world. And they would depart recounting astonishing events they had witnessed.

Just a few weeks later came the Festival of First Fruits. It had been observed for some 1800 years as a celebration of the harvest provided by God. And so it was that in the year that Christ was crucified, First Fruits would bring another crowd of curious Jews to Jerusalem just in time to experience the baptism of the Spirit. Among other things, they saw people from all over the world curiously and gloriously changed- the first fruits of the Spirit. And they departed telling everyone they met.

For centuries the Jews had observed these events without truly grasping the true significance. But suddenly in God’s timing, Passover and then First Fruits brought multitudes to Jerusalem just in time to be... to be witnesses!

And as they departed, they traveled broad, safe roads built by the Romans a century earlier. Before the rise of Rome, travel was brutally painful and extremely unsafe. But the network of well made Roman highways policed by armed troops, ensured that travelers had a much better chance of reaching their destination.

And as they traveled those Roman roads, the Jews were able to speak with everyone they met because of the shared Greek language. Three hundreds year before Christ, Alexander the Great had conquered most of the known world, spreading the Greek language as the vocabulary of business and education. Before Alexander, people across borders could scarcely speak to one another.

"Timing is everything." And so it was that God used ancient Jewish festivals, arrogant Romans, and pagan Greeks to build an elevated stage on which Jesus Christ would preach his Gospel. Before Paul ever considered his first missionary journey, Christians were already beginning to turn up in strange, distant locations. And so the soil was already broken when Paul arrived to plant the Gospel. No wonder critics sometimes complain, “Of course Christianity succeeded where previous religions failed. Jesus was lucky enough to arrive at precisely the right moment."

But as someone has wisely noted, “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” God's detailed, advance preparation over a period of two thousand years gave His Church all the advantages. So let’s not be slackers and waste the chance to reach our generation.