One of my main ministries here in Hong Kong is to pray for people for healing of the emotions. One of the first goals is to help people know what they are feeling. Lately, I have been thinking about what people felt in the New Testament times and how it relates to us in the modern age. Here are a few thoughts:
I wonder what Peter felt when he failed even when he tried so hard. Jesus rebuked Peter more than the other apostles. There were times when Jesus told Peter that he was a man of little faith, although the Greek says that Peter had undeveloped faith. In the end, Peter was a man of great faith even his shadow healed people as he walked by.
I wonder what John felt when he cuddled up to Jesus. John knew what relationship was. He knew Jesus' love. He even said he was the disciple that Jesus loved.
I wonder what the lady that wanted the demon cast out of her child felt when Jesus told her that He should not feed the dogs with the children’s bread. Knowing that Jesus is love, I realize that He was just speaking her language. He was just wanting to be her friend. In the end, the demon was cast out.
I wonder how the other disciples felt when Jesus took three of His disciples with Him and they had a mountian top experience but left the others behind. Everyone has a different relationship with Jesus and I guess it wasn't any different at that time.
How did Pilate feel when the Jews wanted to kill Jesus and He did not want to put Jesus to death. Even Pilate's wife had a warning dream not to lay a hand on Jesus. In the end, Pilate acted out of fear of the Jews but at the same time fulfilling prophecy and accomplishing God's will.
How did the soldiers feel when they were beating Jesus or did they feel anything? Most of the time when people have to do bad things to people or they have had bad things happen to them, they become frozen in their emotions. In the end, I'm not sure what happened to those guys but I hope they became Christians. They did experience the blood of Jesus.
What did Judas feel when he realized he had betrayed Jesus to His death. Most of the time, Judas was so interested in his own wants that Judas did not have a real relationship with Jesus. In the end, he couldn't go to Jesus for forgiveness so Judas died in his sorrow. It's sad when this happens because Jesus's loves never fails.
What did Mary feel when she saw Jesus being mistreated and hung on a cross? His mother watched as her hopes of prophecies spoken over Him went into the prophecy grave yard. In the end, she found out it was just a death of a vision and God raised Him up from the dead.
What did the disciples feel when they were cowards and ran when Jesus was in His darkest hour? Fear, shame, confusion, and depression? But after the Holy Spirit came, they turned into different men.
What did the leaders feel when their whole religious system and even their whole culture was being turned upside down？ Like many of us, when our world is being turned upside down, our feelings go crazy. In the end, they tried to destroy the very thing that would have given them life.
What did people feel after being healed after many years of sickness? Have you ever thought what it would be like to be healed after years of being sick? People that were deaf probably couldn't sleep because of the noise. Those who were blind may have been in vision overload because of regaining their sight.
Even though there is no way we can know what people felt at that time, I doubt that it was much different than we feel today. I'm sure that the ones that followed Jesus after He died had a fulfilled life. The encouraging thing is that if we go to Jesus we can have an amazing life, too.
Bruce Isom
