The gospel of John records three instances where Jesus hid,  left or removed himself from the public eye (John 5:13, 8:59,10:39).  Curious isn’t it, that as effective as He was at healing and teaching, that He would intentionally draw away, removing Himself from the very people He had come to show Himself as  Emanuel to (God with us)?

Our scripture for today (John 12:20-36) reveals several deep Kingdom of God principals… for starters; Focus of Energy in the Direction of God’s will Produces not just Additional Change, it Produces Transformation and Multiplication.  Jesus was choosing to spend (focus) his time in such a way as to bring about the perfect will of God in His life.  By Jesus leaving and hiding that day – he was focusing on God’s perfect will.  By drawing away from the crowds Jesus lived out His determination to invest heavily into the 12 disciples  so that they could carry on the work that He had been doing long after he was gone. In fact, John 14:12 records Jesus saying that “he who believes in me will do even greater things than I have been doing because I go to the Father.” He said: “no” to the crowds that day and “yes” to focused time with His closest disciples.

By John chapter 12 the culmination of Jesus physical life on earth was about to be realized, the brutal experience of the cross was near.  Yet all of the prayers, miracles, conversations and decisions he had made had focused on one outcome… that His life would be a perfect fulfillment of God’s will bringing transformation to all who believed in Him for forgiveness and life.

Life is full of really hard decisions.  Jesus didn’t heal everyone as he walked the through the hurting crowds. People still died and He didn’t raise them from the dead nor did He prevent His own death on a Roman cross.   However, because of Jesus’ laser focus on building a world wide church (His body) out of those 12 disciples His work has been multiplied through the ministry of the Holy Spirit millions of times over in and through local churches all over the globe.

Jesus would not be deterred from God’s perfect will. Jesus left and hid (from public ministry so that he could pour himself into and prepare the 12 disciples for God’s perfect will in their lives too).  As a result 11 of those 12 moved out into the world doing even greater things than He did.  2000 years and billions of transformed lives later His multiplication of lives transformed continues.