Why is it that Mondays are often the hardest day of the week? Maybe it's because you go from a place of rest to a place of activity, frustration and conflict. Most Mondays, I'd rather be hiding out in a coffee shop.

Palm Sunday was great, but the Monday after Jesus must have felt depressingly human. The scene, as Mark describes it, is oddly encouraging insofar as it shows us Jesus wrestling with his humanity.

Jesus wakes up in Bethany wanting to get to the temple in Jerusalem. Of course, being homeless, he's hungry.

In the distance he sees a hopeful sign - a fig tree.

But it's not fig season. So then Jesus has his kick-the-dog moment. He's so hungry and ticked that he curses the poor tree: "May no one ever eat fruit from you again!"

At this point, no doubt the disciples must have been muttering amongst themselves. "Whoah. Poor tree." I can imagine Peter saying to John, "Hey, just give the master some space. Who knows what's going to happen next."

And then, sure enough, the next we see him, he's going on a rampage in, of all places, the church. There we see him throwing furniture around and calling it "a den of robbers."

Of course none of this excuses my behavior. But it helps me to realize the truth of the verse, he was "tempted in every way, just as we are."

If we have a bad Monday here or there, Jesus can empathize. People expect life to be easy just because they follow Jesus - what do you think? My thought is it just dials up the pressure.