When the seventy (or 72) return from their mission with joy, Jesus receives their joy happily but redirects it upward and outward to the reign of God. They should rejoice not that the spirits submit to them but rather that their names are written in heaven (Luke 10.20).
But the next part of Luke in which Jesus rejoices gets left out. After he tells the disciples to rejoice:
At that same hour Jesus rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, ‘I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.’
Then turning to the disciples, Jesus said to them privately, ‘Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it.’
- Luke 10.21-24
Jesus rejoices over the disciples ability to see, however dimly, the hidden things of the mysteries of heaven and earth. They, like us, have received the eyes of infants and those eyes have seen what even kings and prophets longed for.
Thanks be that Jesus has chosen to reveal the Father to us and that our eyes have been opened to see the wonders that prophets spoke of.
