Tuesday in Holy Week
He was overworked, grumpy and alienated. He didn't like Jerusalem and he certainly didn't like being pestered by foreigners.
"Beware Greeks bearing gifts," he muttered to himself. He knew it was a cheap shot but they were a tricky lot. Stay-at-home Jews - even Greek Jews - might not be perfect but the ones who came in for the Festival were never satisfied. And they went through the rituals but their fancy clothes and jaunty steps spoke of a different agenda.
And now a group of them were hemming him in, asking for a special audience with Jesus as if he was some sort of magician. He had no alternative if he wanted to escape, so he went through the motions with Andrew but he knew that Jesus had too many other things on his mind: ever since his Hosanna entry the factions had been competing with each other to trap Jesus; and he could feel them closing in. "If they can't get him fair and square," he thought, "then will find some excuse to seize him."
He still couldn't work it out. He knew that Jesus had been a bit short with him over the feeding of the crowd but his beloved leader had never hurt anyone and his healings were countless. Why would they want to put somebody in prison for doing good?
Stay-at-home Jews weren't perfect: "and if we have a fault," he admitted to himself, "it is that we don't give people the benefit of the doubt. It's as if we want to catch people breaking the Law; and I suppose that Jesus has been guilty of some technical breaches; but the people who were cured won't care about that. Although they won't be grateful either."
There he was now, talking about himself as the source of new life, about being raised up. Perhaps the main reason Jesus was becoming unpopular had nothing to do with the Law. Perhaps it was just that a rigid system didn't have the capacity to handle generosity. Jesus was overflowing everywhere and there wasn't enough capacity to contain it.
Philip saw the Greeks smirking but most people couldn't get enough of him. It was obvious if you looked objectively why the Temple hierarchy were rattled. They never commanded the kind of attention Jesus got and everyone knew why. They were too interested in outward show. Jesus accused them of being hypocrites which didn't go down well; but it was the story about the vineyard that would do for him; that and the Hosanna demonstration.
How could people be so ungrateful? There was hardly anyone in that crowd born in the Province who hadn't benefited from Jesus through the cure of a relative or friend, or through hearing first hand or by word of mouth some of his beautiful and powerful teaching.
"Beware Jesus bearing gifts!" It didn't sound quite right.