The End of the Christian Life: Lenten Study Companion Final Week
Author: J. Todd Billings and Kaitlyn DeVries
March 31, 2026
“When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, ‘Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?’ But he turned and rebuked them.” –Luke 9:51–55
As we enter this Holy Week, we follow Jesus who ‘set his face to go to Jerusalem.’ Jerusalem, where our Lord would be mocked and crucified. In contrast to the disciples, who would have had Jesus show his royal power by calling down the fire of judgment, Jesus knew and tried to tell them that “the Son of Man is going to be betrayed into human hands” (Luke 9:44).
The disciples didn’t understand. In our daily lives, we don’t either. We want resurrection power without the cross. We don’t want to turn our face toward Jerusalem, carry our cross, and follow him.
Our earthly pilgrimage in Christ will involve trials and suffering. Yet, Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem, not to suffer as an end in itself, but to bring reconciliation through his death. And we set our faces toward our trials in a hope grounded in that reconciliation in Christ.
Jerusalem was a special city because God claimed the center of it — the temple — to be his own dwelling place. In the temple, heaven and earth came together, like in the garden of Eden. In a great mystery, Christ himself, in his death and resurrection, shows how he is the true Temple, the ultimate dwelling place of God. When Christ died on the cross, the veil separating the holy of holies from the rest of the temple was torn “from top to bottom” (Matt. 27:51). The sin separating sinners from God was likewise torn, opening the way for an astonishing Easter hope: that those who dwell in Christ, the Temple, will dwell with God in the new creation. Christ will return, to shake our good but corrupted cosmos; and then, raised with Christ and covered in his righteousness, we will dwell with God as his people. This is an astonishing, life-giving hope for mortal pilgrims like us!
Practice:
• Daily: Prayer is a way to ‘set our faces,’ aligning our priorities with God’s. This chapter points to an old children’s bedtime prayer that sets our faces to rest our living and dying in God’s hands. Practice saying this prayer before you go to bed each night this week: Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. Amen.
• This Week: If you are able, attend a Good Friday service at a church you are connected to. Remembering the story of Jesus’ death, note especially the moment when the temple curtain is torn (Matt. 27:51). As you mourn Christ’s death, celebrate the reconciliation that we find in him.
Prayer:
As you pray, ask the Spirit to empower you to carry your cross in following Jesus, grounded in the deep hope of reconciliation through Christ’s death and resurrection.
Study based on The End of the Christian Life, by J. Todd Billings. Used with permission.
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