“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killed the prophets, and stoned them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not! Behold, your house is left unto you desolate: and verily I say unto you, Ye shall not see Me, until the time come when ye shall say, Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord”— Luke 13:34, 3534O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not! 35Behold, your house is left unto you desolate: and verily I say unto you, Ye shall not see me, until the time come when ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. (Luke 13:34‑35).
THERE is something pathetic in this lament over Jerusalem, the city privileged above every other, and yet destined to become the guiltiest city in all the world, because there the holy Saviour was to be crucified and slam as the many prophets of the Lord had been slain in the years gone by. Like a brooding hen seeking to shelter her chicks from the hawk, so the Lord Jesus would have saved Israel and delivered Jerusalem from her enemies, temporal and spiritual, but her people refused to hear His voice.
From the moment He uttered these words, the Jewish nation was set to one side to make way for the new order, which was to begin on the coming feast of Pentecost. Israel had crossed over the dead line. Their national hope was perished. Not until the return of the Lord from heaven will they be taken up again, when a nation shall be born in a day (Isa. 66:88Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children. (Isaiah 66:8)). Then, as a regenerated people, they shall cry, “Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord.” Messiah has returned to His own place at the Father’s right hand, until in the hour of their great affliction, Israel shall turn to Him and seek and find deliverance.
“From heaven His eye is downward turned,
Still glancing to and fro,
Where’er in this wide wilderness
There roams a child of woe.
And when the rebel chooses wrath
God wails his hapless lot.
Deep-breathing from His heart of love,
‘I would, but ye would not.’”