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Luke 21:37–38
“Every day [Jesus] was teaching in the temple, but at night he went out and lodged on the mount called Olivet. And early in the morning all the people came to him in the temple to hear him.”
Most of Luke 21 features the Olivet Discourse, so named because Jesus preached it on the Mount of Olives (vv. 5–36; see Matt. 24:1–35). With the account of this discourse concluded, Luke in today’s passage gives us a summary of Jesus’ actions in Jerusalem during the final week of His life (Luke 21:37–38). As we will see, Luke’s summation helps us understand that Jesus was faithful in His ministry until the point of death.
First, let us note that Luke 21:37 indicates what Jesus did during the evenings while He spent the last week of His earthly ministry in Jerusalem. Luke tells us that “at night [Jesus] went out and lodged on the mount called Olivet.” Mark 11:11 and John 12:1 mention that our Lord spent time during this week in Bethany, the village where his friends Mary, Martha, and Lazarus lived. Bethany sat on the edge of the Mount of Olives, about two miles outside Jerusalem (see John 11:17–20). Perhaps Jesus stayed at the home of His friends in Bethany during the evenings of the week of His passion.
More significantly, Luke reports that during the week, Jesus “was teaching in the temple” every day, and that people came to the temple in the morning to hear Him (Luke 21:37–38). The climax of our Lord’s saving work was at hand, with the crucifixion only days, or even hours, away. Jesus was about to endure the worst suffering that any human being would ever experience, so it would have been understandable, humanly speaking, if He had entirely withdrawn from the crowds to spend time exclusively with those closest to Him. Yet our Savior chose to continue ministering to the crowds, for that is the reason He came. Christ said at the outset of His earthly ministry, “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns as well; for I was sent for this purpose” (4:43). Matthew Henry comments that Jesus “was an indefatigable preacher; he preached in the face of opposition, and in the midst of those that he knew sought occasion against him.”
Jesus is far more than just a good example for us, for He came to save us from our sin (Matt. 1:21). We can by no means imitate Him in that work. Yet while Jesus is more than a model for us, He is certainly not less than that (John 13:15), and His perseverance in ministry is something that we can imitate by the power of the Holy Spirit. We can never retire from the kingdom of God, so we must strive to persevere in service to the Lord until the end of our lives.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Age, infirmity, and the circumstances in which we find ourselves will affect how we serve Christ over the course of our lives. We may, in fact, have to cease certain ministry activities depending on where God’s providence places us. Yet we can and must continue to serve the Lord’s kingdom until the very end, whether that means active ministry, faithful giving to kingdom work, persevering prayer for others, or some combination of all those things.
For further study
- Psalm 71:17–18
- Ecclesiastes 12:13–14
- John 13:1
- Revelation 2:8–11
The bible in a year
- Jeremiah 29–30
- Titus 1