Today, I am reading and commenting on  John 12-13.

As I read this through initially, I noticed that John connects the request from some “Greeks” to speak with Jesus to Jesus publicly predicting His coming death.  Most, if not all, of the other places where Jesus openly predicted His death were spoken privately to just His disciples.  I want to note that there is some disagreement about whether these “Greeks” were Jews who had adopted Greek culture or Gentiles.  I believe that John here is referring to Gentiles (as I understand the First Century, those who were not Romans but considered themselves cosmopolitan thought of themselves as “Greeks).  If I am correct, these would have been Gentiles who sought to worship God.  The arrival of these Greeks looking to meet Jesus which signaled to Him that the hour of His death, the time when He would be glorified, was upon Him.  And while this was the hour for the Son of Man, Jesus, to be glorified, Jesus chose to emphasize that it was really about glorifying God the Father.  So, we should live our lives such that God is glorified by our deaths.  Whether that means we die the death of a martyr, or die in our beds in a way which brings glory to God, we should strive for that.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.