After my 17 years of poor-motivation and a general lack of achievement, God dramatically led me to make the most of twelfth grade. That fall, I studied like never before, and though my spring grades would not count toward class rank, I kept at it, motivated by my own goal of making a 4.0 for the first time ever. I was impervious to “senioritis” because my motivation was not connected to graduation. I had bigger plans.
When I found myself teaching high school seniors eight years later, I constantly told them I did not believe in senioritis, and that it was not even a real thing.
And that’s true: senioritis is not a real thing—that is, it is not a clinical diagnosis. Rather, it is a colloquial name for the decreased motivation students feel when they see the end approaching. And THAT is a real thing. We have all experienced that.
Most of us experience it not only during our final years in school, but even during the final day of the work week. Of course, “Fridayitis” doesn’t have the same ring to it. But motivation decreases anytime you see the end in sight, whether it is the end of the day, the end of the week, or the end of high school or college. (Be like a track star—run faster when you see the goal approaching.)
Jesus knew the cross was coming. He saw the end in sight–He saw His goal approaching.
But rather than do less, He chose that time to pick His biggest fight ever with the religious authorities. Would He heal on the sabbath again? Or raise another dead man? Call the chief priests hypocrites and whitewashed tombs? No. This time He would employ actual violence, cracking a whip and driving a crowd of people and animals out of His Father’s house.
“And after He had made a scourge of small cords, He drove them all out of the temple” John 2:15.
Think about that: He MADE His whip. He did not simply “lose it” and start causing a scene. This thing was planned. He spent the morning weaving a whip so He could use it to drive the cheating merchants out of the holy place. The whole scene was calculated. Jesus knew it would increase His enemies’ determination to kill Him. (Maybe that was one reason He did it?)
But follow His emotions. Before pulling out the whip, He told the Pharisees about the coming destruction of Jerusalem (which many would live to see in 70 A.D.). “The day will come when your enemies will … crush you and your children to the ground … they will not leave one stone on top of another…” Luke 19:43-44.
Jesus knows He will be dead within the week.
And He knows the temple will soon be destroyed and the people of Jerusalem along with it.
Jesus could see the end in view—the end of things He loved deeply. But rather than lose His motivation, Jesus went on the offensive. He “poked the bear” and made things even more challenging for Himself.
Even when He saw His goals approaching, Jesus was not a man defeated by the lethargy of senioritis. Are you?
Read Luke 19.
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