Luke 13:34
O 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! O 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!
Christ wept in lament over Jerusalem, the favored city that killed the prophets and stoned those sent to her, as He looked upon her and foresaw her destruction and the leaving of her house desolate. As a hen gathers her brood under her wings, He longed with repeated, motherlike devotion to gather, shelter and protect her children under His mediatorial care and breathe spiritual life into them. For centuries and then for three years in person He pleaded, scattered blessings and gave every measure heaven ordained for peace and salvation, yet waves of mercy were beaten back by indifference and contempt. Their ruin came not because they could not come but because they would not, rejecting not merely human ministers but their Redeemer, His Word and His offered life, even to crucifying Him. Because they refused, the temple was desolated, grace ceased to be heard in the city, and the people were left defenseless and scattered when mercy's last resource was exhausted, a warning to every church and institution that perverts great light and refuses to walk in it lest it come under the same lament.
Lament's Setting and Meaning
The lament was uttered in tears on the crest of Olivet during the triumphal entry, as He looked upon Jerusalem and the temple gilded by the setting sun. It was spoken as He foresaw the city's destruction before declaring its house desolate, and it marked a painful separation as He left the temple after completing His work. Jerusalem was the disobedient city, the Israel of God given every advantage. She killed the prophets and stoned those sent to her, venting hatred of God upon them.
The hen gathering her brood pictures repeated, motherlike devotion and tender desire to gather, shelter, uplift and protect her children under His wings and mediatorial protection. Those who flee to Him for refuge are gathered there and kept safe. Like a hen defending her brood He resists the enemy and would die rather than let the sheltered suffer. It is a longing to breathe spiritual life into discouraged hearts ready to die, and to gather fallen people through faith under His banner and sheltering care.
His weeping was not for Himself but for them, the last tears of rejected love shed in anguish and lamentation with remorse for those who felt no remorse. His sorrow was over their sins and condition, and over the loss of a nation loved and cared for as a son. He wept in broken speech from an overwhelming burden of love like that of Moses interceding for Israel. His rebukes and warnings came from sorrow, not lack of love, and pronouncing the irrevocable sentence was hard for Him.
He is the world's Redeemer, the Majesty of heaven and messenger of mercy. He is the Restorer who longs to shelter and bring back His erring children under His protective care. He grieves because the people He came to save reject God's help, and He longed to shelter them with love and save them from retribution. His saving arm is also strong to punish.
Rejected Mercy and Desolation
How often means repeated, long-continued pleading through centuries in which divine wrath was restrained while impenitence and abuse were borne, with every measure heaven ordained for peace and salvation given. For three years He came Himself and not only through prophets and delegates, working unselfishly, pleading for admittance, and scattering blessings. Waves of mercy beaten back by indifference, contempt and rejection returned again to break rocky hearts.
The decisive word is would not, not could not, for failure to know what belonged to their peace came from unwillingness, not inability. Their doom was their own choice, not His desire to forsake them, and those lost because they will not come bear responsibility themselves. Their refusal was not merely refusal of human ministers but of their Redeemer, His life-giving Word and the life He offered. He had labored to bring them to recognize Him as the promised Messiah and only hope, yet they despised His love, rejected His mercy, and rejected light, warnings and entreaties. In a few short hours they would reject their King and God and crucify Him by wicked Jewish hands, and by persecuting the Son of God they filled their cup of iniquity.
Because they refused, the city faced desolation and destruction, with the temple soon to be desolated and its veil rent, the glory designed for the chosen nation removed, and grace no longer to be heard in the city. Refusal to be gathered would leave the people defenseless, scattered and despised among the nations. Their time of probation and day of mercy and reprieve was ending after no means to lead them to repentance was left untried and mercy's last resource was exhausted. Even while He wept, Jerusalem could still have repented and escaped its impending desolation while mercy waited for acceptance.
In rejecting Christ the people hardened their hearts and gave themselves into Satan's power so that acceptance became impossible. If love in Jesus is not appreciated and does not become an abiding principle to soften the soul, the person is utterly lost because God can give no greater manifestation of love and there are no other means to reach the heart. Every refusal and failure to open the heart strengthens unbelief, makes hearing more unwilling, and diminishes response to the last appeal of mercy, ending in the house left desolate.
Warning for Churches Today
Jerusalem fell because it abused great privileges and the light entrusted to it, rejecting God's messengers and refusing repeated desire to gather and protect. Greater light and opportunity do not save, make safe, or commend to God, but increase responsibility to prize privileges and use them rightly to advance His glory.
Jerusalem, which killed the prophets and stoned those sent to her while He longed again and again to shelter her children as a hen shelters her brood, represents the world that rejects and despises His grace. His distress and anguish of soul over the loss of a nation loved and cared for is a symbol of the giving up of a world and the terrible loss of souls. As Jerusalem was given up to destruction, so the world will be given up to doom, and the scenes of Jerusalem's destruction will be repeated at the great and terrible day of the Lord in a more fearful manner.
Jerusalem was favored as depository of sacred trusts with great light, pardon, healing, and messages of pardon and righteousness, yet her people perverted truth, despised entreaties, warnings and counsels, cherished selfishness and love of mammon, envy, strife and gain, and perverted the temple courts with merchandise, robbery, injustice and fraud. She is therefore a representation and warning of what the church will become if it refuses to receive and walk in the light given, and all who follow in her tread and repeat her sin by rejecting warnings in this day come under the same lament. So He sorrows and weeps over churches and institutions of learning that fail to meet God's demand and move in the same track, coming to investigate them after doing all that could be done and flashing light before their eyes lest their sins reach the boundary where repentance cannot be felt, while by long departure from just and righteous principles people place themselves where light, truth, justice and mercy are not discerned until that course becomes part of their very nature.
Voluntary refusal is the key to the whole mystery of impenitence, wickedness and great apostasy, not inability but ye would not. That refusal explains the Jewish nation in His day, met with constant apparent failure because satanic influences worked in minds and hearts of priests and rulers to oppose Him, and it likewise explains the Protestant churches in the present day.
The same appeal expresses His yearning for souls in great cities who do not know what would bring them peace. It applies to a person who has turned from wise counsel, showing that rejecting loving guidance is refusing the care He offers, and to straying workers to be brought back to their place, refused through blinding unbelief and self-sufficiency. His reproof of sin does not end His patient labor for reformation of those in error, and His grief requires tender sympathy and compassion toward the unsaved. For those gathered through faith under His banner and sheltering care, He as substitute and surety takes responsibility for the race, has their sins imputed to Him, assumes all their debts, pledges His word to atone for transgression, and forms in them a character like His own by imputing His righteous character to them.