I Peter 2:19-25 (NRSV)
19 For it is a credit to you if, being aware of God, you endure pain while suffering unjustly. 20 If you endure when you are beaten for doing wrong, what credit is that? But if you endure when you do right and suffer for it, you have God’s approval. 21 For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps.
22 “He committed no sin,
and no deceit was found in his mouth.”
23 When he was abused, he did not return abuse; when he suffered, he did not threaten; but he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. 24 He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. 25 For you were going astray like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls.
I Peter 2:19-25 is part of a larger segment 2:13-3:12 that shares maxims for daily living.
Here is the author’s comment on the appropriate Christian "take" on the traditional household codes of attitudes and behaviors. In the established and accepted hierarchical culture of first-century Asia Minor, relationships were dictated by a strict "pecking order" - both in the household and in the marketplace. In 2:18-3:7, he challenges these Christians to base their reactions and relationships on a greater standard - the code of behavior established by Jesus Christ himself. The opposing approach would be for Christians to react and behave within the accepted cultural norms. Early Christians had several distinguishing marks from their surrounding culture. For one thing, many Romans and Greeks did not consider Christianity to be a religion in their sense. They did not have altars from which to make sacrifices, nor priests who were experts in their ritual. They did not honor the emperor with images nor the gods of the culture. Their simplicity of worship made them appear as “atheists,” to use the term of the opponents of the church. They were bookish in the sense that they treasured Jewish scripture and the writings of the apostles. Such sacred writings were primarily known only to priests in the religions of the time. The early Christians also pointed the way to a different way of life. Even the ancient household, composed of husband and wife, parents and children, and master and slave, was to undergo profound alteration. Whereas Romans often exposed unwanted babies to the elements leaving them to die, Christians raised their own children and even adopted some of those who were rejected by their neighbors. Women were expected to be faithful in marriage, but men could fool around at will. Christians, on the other hand, insisted that both women and men needed to be faithful to one another in monogamous, lifelong marriage. While Romans enjoyed the blood sport of the gladiator arena, it was the Christians who refused to play along. Indeed, many would die in the arena themselves as a result.[1] Each of these areas of difference with the culture created the possibility for persecution. The history of the persecuted church is that it is an anvil that has worn out many hammers.[2] Unjust suffering was part of what Christians expected. I believe people started responding to the gospel message was that its apostles, prophets, and teachers convinced them of the truthfulness of their message. God truly had done something unique, distinctive, and powerful in Jesus of Nazareth. Believing in its truth led the community naturally distinguish itself by a specific way of life patterned after the way of Jesus, especially as he suffered and died for us.
19 For it is a credit (χάρις, not denoting something earned; a more literal rendering reading, "This is grace before God.") God does not bestow this "grace" because the slave humbly submits to an unjust beating from his master. Such grace comes to you, addressing them personally, if, being aware of God, you endure pain while suffering unjustly, acknowledging the full humanity of slaves by the fact that masters can treat them unjustly. Peter calls attention to the abuses of their situation with uniquely Christian insight. The Christian community reveals its revolutionary perspective on slavery by the fact that it addresses slaves in scriptural texts numerous times. When it addresses "slaves”, they are not property. They are full human beings and full members of the church. Thus, the text reveals the difference between Christian attitudes and the culture's attitudes about slaves. Pagan culture would not even consider making a direct plea to slaves. In that value system, the culture saw them as something owned, not someone enslaved. Aristotle had even argued that it was logically impossible for a slave to suffer an "injustice" -- because slaves were simply property, not people. Undoubtedly, receiving mistreatment or suffering injustices at the hands of a master were quite familiar issues to the intended readers of this epistle. Among the Christians I Peter addresses, there were obviously Gentile slaves and servants -- or those who had once been slaves but had managed to gain their freedom. Suffering for one's faith is always a grace. However, how should Christian workers react to persecution? 20 If you endure when you are beaten for doing wrong (ἁμαρτάνοντες), what credit (κλέος) is that? But if you endure when you do right (ἀγαθοποιοῦντες) and suffer (πάσχοντες) for it, you have God’s approval (χάρις). He is aware of the abuses his readers have likely experienced as slaves. God's "approval" is not of the behavior -- either the slave's or the master's -- but of the slave's correct understanding of Jesus' own commitment to suffering and the slave's conscious imitation of this Christ-inspired attitude. The suffering of the Son upon the cross for the sake of others, in part, is an opportunity for humanity to see the evil of which it is capable and repent of it. In a similar way, if the slave can keep the suffering of the innocent Jesus of Nazareth in mind and imitate him, those who abuse the slave may see their inhumanity and repent. Of course, given the human historical record, humanity is fully capable of enjoying inflicting suffering upon others and even viewing it as commanded by God. Such is the blindness of humanity to the depths to which it can sink in its lack of goodness and morality.
Yes, and how many ears must one man have
Before he can hear people cry?
Yes, and how many deaths will it take 'til he knows
That too many people have died?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind.[3]
Before he can hear people cry?
Yes, and how many deaths will it take 'til he knows
That too many people have died?
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind.[3]
21 For to this you have been called, thereby stipulating that Peter addresses baptized Christians who are full members of the community of faith. As baptized Christians, they have already received the gifts of grace and redemption. God calls them to endure injustice in this way because Christ also suffered (ἔπαθεν) for you, leaving you an example, the "grace" of putting up with injustice having its basis in the example of Christ, so that you should follow in his steps. Christians who receive ill-treatment should remember Jesus crucified for their sins, innocent and patient. Christ suffered for them. Now, the author reminds his readers, participation in Christ's life, death and resurrection also means participation in the suffering he endures for the sake of others, and he urges his readers to "imitate" or "follow" Christ as closely as possible -- even "in his steps." I Peter's image shows that Christ has already broken the trail, in that God calls Christians to follow his path. It is important to note here that Christians do not suffer because of their sins (for Christ already suffered and died for those, once and for all). Suffering is a natural consequence of a faithful Christian response to the world. Christians follow in the steps of Jesus in his inferiority and suffering.[4]
In I Peter 2: 22-25, we find Peter invoking the Hebrew Scriptures' theology of the "Suffering Servant," focusing upon Isaiah 53:4-7, 9. In fact, there is a creedal feel and sound to these verses. It is quite likely that here we have an established creedal formula already used in the church which I Peter imports here into his text. The image of Christ as the Suffering Servant further supports I Peter's concept that the obedient Christian must likewise experience suffering at the hands of others. 22 “He committed no sin (ἁμαρτίαν), and no deceit was found in his mouth.” The creed shifts to Isaiah 53:7 with the image of the silent sheep before its slaughterers as a template for the proper attitude of a Christian while enduring suffering. 23 When he was abused, he did not return abuse; when he suffered (πάσχων), he did not threaten; but he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. If Christians suffer, their suffering is only a faint reflection of the suffering of Christ.[5] While human beings will inflict suffering upon the good or innocent, God will not do so. Human beings are unjust in their dealing with each other. God always judges justly. The creedal portion of the text ends here.
24 He himself bore our sins (ἁμαρτίας) in his body on the cross (ξύλον or tree). The suffering of Christ for us in verse 21 means Christ bore our sins in his body on the cross. The NRSV has translated this verse with a bit less drama than the original text suggests. Invoking the desolate image of Deuteronomy 21:22 (the one hung on a tree was cursed by God), I Peter speaks of Jesus' carrying our sins away through the power of the "tree" -- this is the work of the cross of redemption on our behalf. This notion plainly has the theme of expiation in it, connecting with the theme of the Lord’s Supper.[6] Christ bore our sins upon the tree so that, free from (ἀπογενόμενοι, dead to) sins, we might live for righteousness. The emphasis shifts from the ways that Jesus endured suffering to what he accomplished as a result. The author makes it clear, then, that passivity has no place within the Christian’s response. It is incumbent upon us whose sins have died with Christ upon the cross are free from sins to live in such a way as to extend justice or righteousness in the world. Therefore, by his wounds you have been healed. Among the images of the human problem of sin is that it is a disease from which humanity needs healing. The image is therapeutic. The wounds and sufferings of Christ for our sins has a healing effect as we direct attention away from self and toward the work of Christ on the cross. It would be quite unthinkable, except as a reflection of the depth to which humanity can descend, to think that once Christ suffered in this way for us and our sins, we would then joyfully take our sins back and continue as before. The point of the healing power of the cross is to start the healing process of freeing us from the power of the disease of sins. Such healing will not reach its conclusion until our death and therefore our rising with Christ in glory. However, the process begins as we have faith in what God has done in Christ. We receive healing through the ultimate act of suffering Jesus endured (using the imagery of Isaiah 53:5b). As Christ’s own experience has made clear, even working to extend God’s righteous justice in the world is no guarantee that we can escape suffering. In fact, reflecting the righteous will of God in this world may well increase our suffering. In the immediate context related to deliverance from sin, clearly some of the recipients’ wounds are spiritual in nature. Nevertheless, quite likely the author has in mind more literal healings as well. The recipients' own bodies may have experienced “beatings” and the “pain” and “suffering” that would attend them. Christ’s “wounds” hold out the possibility for healing in this area as well. Yet healing is not necessarily equivalent to escape. Once more, in keeping with the pattern of Christ’s own experience, it may be final and complete healing and wholeness are received only from “the one who judges justly” in the life to come. 25 For you were going astray like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd (Ποιμένα) and guardian (Ἐπίσκοπον,overseer, bishop) of your souls. Sheep who were astray have come to the flock of which Jesus is shepherd. In his final use of the suffering servant passage, recalling Isaiah 53:6, the author puts his words in the past tense -- indicating that for these converted Gentiles, "straying" and "returning" are events already accomplished in their lives. The shepherd and guardian or "overseer" of their souls is now Jesus. Among the images of ordained ministry today involves pastors as being shepherds of their flock. Many in ordained ministry have had the title “bishop.” This passage is a good reminder that the true shepherd and bishop of each member of the people of God is the risen Lord. Christ is their good shepherd. Pastors must consider that their ministry is not their own, but Christ’s. At ordination, Jesus Christ, the bishop of our souls, is the one who really acts as in response to the ordination prayer he sends his Holy Spirit into the hearts of those who pray.[7]
Peter is giving specific advice to Christian slaves as to how they need to respond to unjust treatment. A misinterpretation of this passage would be to counsel people to use their freedom to stay in abusive and dangerous situations, mostly commonly at home, although such situations can arise at work as well. The slave of the ancient household had far less freedom than do members of the modern household. The ancient household was the basis of intimate family relationships as well as the heart of work and learning a trade. It often consisted of 15-30 people and had multiple families. Thus, if we understand this circumstance as an example, we could look upon other examples to gain insights. In the most trying of circumstances, they are to be aware of God, endure pain, do what is right, respond to violence with nonviolence, and live righteously. Doing what is right and awareness of God is not just for favorable circumstances. Obviously, Jesus did these things, and more, throughout the course of his life and in the most trying of circumstances. What did Jesus do? While sinless himself and without deceit (v. 22), he suffered for our sakes. When Jesus was abused, he did not abuse in return. When suffering, he did not threaten. His body carried the ravages of mistreatment. By the end of his life, scars marked his wrists and side. Thorns scratched his forehead. Leather cords weighted with sharp bones or stones shredded the flesh on his back. His feet were callused from walking throughout Galilee. His heart was broken when friends died, when the faithless walked away, when the ones he loved most failed to get it. The body of our Lord bore the marks of great pain and suffering. Yet, Jesus carried with him unspeakable beauty, power and glory. Jesus teaches us to embrace our sufferings and the many imperfections of life, and then let them bring us to a beauty that is deep, compassionate and unspeakably radiant. It is the pearl-in-the-oyster thing. Peter calls the endurance of unjust suffering an opportunity to receive God's blessing. Suffering when we live righteously brings a peculiar beauty that will not go unrewarded: "By his wounds [we] have been healed" (v.24).
On February 14, 1864, during the latter half of the American Civil War (or the Yankee War of Aggression, as it's still known by many in the South), the first 500 Union prisoners of war arrived at the newly opened Confederate stockade in Andersonville, Georgia. Andersonville was far from the war front, and, with the Confederate government needing every available man in the ranks, this remote POW camp in the rural South was in a place where enemy raids were less likely. Only a skeleton force was needed to guard the prisoners. It was also far away from any possibility of inspection by Union officials, who had stopped the longstanding practice of prisoner exchanges that had prevailed earlier in the war.
When those first prisoners walked into the gates of Andersonville, officially named Camp Sumter in honor of the first battle in the war, they entered a stockade designed to hold 10,000 men. It had log walls and covered 16.5 acres with a small stream running through it. By the summer of 1864, the prison would be expanded to 26.5 acres, but the population of Union prisoners within that small enclosure would swell to as many as 32,000 men. The combination of a grossly overcrowded prison, a water source polluted with filth and a dearth of Confederate resources for food, clothing and shelter, resulted in suffering on an unimaginable scale.
The prisoners were forced to live in makeshift shelters made from ragged wool blankets, which provided some shade from the Georgia sun, but were virtually useless in the rain. Others burrowed into the slope of the prison grounds where they risked being buried by cave-ins. The stream became fouled by human waste, leading to the constant threat of disease. Rations were meager, infrequent and often inedible. As one soldier wrote, "The Johneys are giving us cooked Rations again & they are enough to vomit a Hog for they are not half cooked, the Beef & the Rice is sour enough to kill the devil or any other tough cuss."
Nearly every soldier was infested with lice. Gangs of raiders formed among the prisoners, and terrorized their former comrades through robbery, violence and extortion. Prisoners were shot when they approached or crossed the "deadline," or the interior line of the stockade, marked by posts designed to keep prisoners from approaching the wall for escape.
By the time Andersonville prison closed at the end of the war, some 45,000 prisoners would enter its gates. Nearly 13,000 would die of disease, starvation, violence or exposure. Most of the dead were quickly buried in a makeshift cemetery outside the walls.
Yet, even amid such intense suffering, many did survive. Some even managed to maintain a sense of normalcy. Cottage industries sprung up in the camp, and prisoners could buy or barter for things like soap, wood, eggs and better food obtained from outside sources. Religious services and prayer meetings were held. One inmate set up a barbershop, complete with a hand-carved barber pole. Others carved chess pieces and other games out of roots found while digging out water wells or shelter (or digging when trying to escape). A few soldiers even salvaged some of the kernels of corn and beans out of their meager rations and planted little three-inch wide gardens around their tents -- a sign of hope. After all, you do not plant a garden unless you believe you're going to be around to harvest it.
How do people survive suffering like this? Viktor Frankl was a Jewish psychiatrist and prisoner in Nazi concentration camps during the Holocaust, where cruelty and suffering was lived out on a scale that dwarfs that of Andersonville. Frankl observed that there was a distinct difference between those who survived and those who simply gave up and died by refusing to eat or move from their beds. The difference? Hope for the future and the belief that there is something worth living for. As Sergeant Major Robert H. Kellogg, a prisoner at Andersonville, put it, "It was those who bore up with brave heart and strong will that came out the best, or perhaps one might say, came out at all."
The early Christian church was no stranger to suffering. Prison, persecution and even being thrown to the lions were constant threats. In I Peter 2:19-25, Peter is writing to churches in Asia Minor where the label "Christian" was making life difficult for people who were coming to know Christ. The Gentiles were slandering and maligning them as "evildoers" because they did not worship the emperor or engage in the usual practices of Roman life (v. 12). Despite that, Peter says that the believers needed to "do right" and not use their freedom in Christ as a "pretext for evil" against their persecutors (vv. 14, 16).
It would have been quite easy for the church to dissolve in the face of such suffering, but it thrived instead. The difference? For Peter, surviving and thriving were all about putting hope in Christ, who endured suffering and left "an example, so that [the church] should follow in his steps" (v. 21).
First, do the right thing no matter what. Jesus did not do wrong and did not speak deceitfully (verse 22). If you do what is right and suffer, receive grace from God (verse 20). Doing what is right acknowledges hope for a future beyond the current situation. Living that future in the present, despite the cost, is an act of hope. Doing the right thing in difficult circumstances requires courage and conviction. If we live out of awareness of God (verse 19) as shown in Christ, we can respond to the trying circumstances in the way Christ has shown.
Second, do not return the abuse. "When he was abused, he didn't return the abuse," says Peter about Jesus, and "when he suffered, he did not threaten; but he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly" (v. 23). Jesus did not lash out at his tormentors; he forgave them instead. The one who preached love for enemies and turning the other cheek practiced what he preached to the end. The trying circumstances of Andersonville was not an easy place to practice doing the right thing or to choose non-violent ways to respond to abuse. Yet, the Christian needs to keep Christ, the true shepherd and bishop of our souls (verse 25), in mind, for he suffered and died so that we would receive healing of the disease of sin in our lives, thereby freeing us to live for righteousness.
Experts say that one of the best ways to retain hope during a terrible situation is not to brood or seek revenge, but to do something for someone else. Reading accounts of life in Andersonville, it becomes clear that many of those prisoners survived because they had hope in the future, faith in God and trust that the man next to him would stand by him just as they had stood by one another in battle. As Christians, we know that the risen Christ is always standing by us, no matter what trial we are going through, but God also calls us to stand by others who are suffering as well.
Long ago, according to Japanese legend, Rikyu Sen no Rikyu, a mere youth, sought to learn the elaborate ritual of customs known as the Way of Tea. Centuries before Starbucks introduced Chai to its coffee lovers, or even before the British instituted Tea Time into its cultural makeup, the Way of Tea was an oriental mainstay. It describes not an art or a hobby but a way of life with its own values, ethics and morals. Rikyu traveled to tea-master Takeeno Joo, who tested the younger man by asking him to tend the garden, another sacred tradition in Japanese culture. Rikyu weeded and cultivated the ground until the garden was aesthetically perfect. However, before presenting the impeccably tilled garden to his master, he scrutinized the immaculate landscape and discerned that something was wrong. The scene was too perfect. He shook a cherry tree, causing a few flowers to spill randomly upon the perfectly manicured ground. He created a new way to look at life: wabi-sabi. While the prevailing aesthetic of 15th-century Japan had preferred lavishness, rich ornamentation and absolute perfection, Rikyu introduced what became a venerated alternative that continues to be revered to this day. Wabi-sabi is the art of finding beauty in the imperfect, the impermanent, and the incomplete. It appreciates the underlying beauty in what is modest, humble and unconventional. His "new way" created a different path to peace, an achievement made possible when rustic simplicity is appreciated. In other words, peace thrives when what is plain and what is beautiful become one.
Americans have this experience as well. Kathleen Norris saw this in Lemmon, South Dakota, as she wrote in her stories. It is what the photographer Walker Evans saw when he pointed a camera at impoverished southerners in the 1930s.
When we feel spiritually ugly and morally decrepit, we turn to a Savior who knows how to make something beautiful out of our tattered lives.
We live in a wounded world, a frayed culture. Rikyu's garden was too perfect and needed some imperfection. The gardens of our church, world, culture, community and souls are, in contrast, too often unsightly and overrun with disorder and imperfection. The cherry tree has been shaken; we now need those who will till the soil, tend the grass, pull the weeds and clip the hedges.
No one knew suffering better than Jesus, whose torments Peter describes in these verses. His horribly ugly death became the most gorgeous act of love, changing our lives, deaths and eternities. The Risen Christ lives to serve as our shepherd and guardian as well.
Jesus himself modeled this new way. In every step of life, he showed us what perfect looks like. It has less to do with outward appearances than with inward awareness. It displays no grand riches or academic credentials.
We begin by realizing -- our lives are already out of order. We do not need to shake a little dust onto our daily routines for that casually ruffled look. We come to Jesus knowing that our homes are not spotless, our paths are not straight, our church falls short of its ideals, our resumes are not perfect, our careers are not flawless, our gardens are not perfectly manicured, our souls are not without sin.
Still we come and sit at the foot of the cross to remember that despite all imperfection, we are free. His wounds have healed us. By his calling, we have come home. At his watch, our souls are protected.
Jesus, our Savior -- showing us the light in darkness, joy in pain and hope in despair.
[1] Larry Hurtado, Destroyer of the gods: Early Christian Distinctiveness in the Roman Word, 2016
[2] May it please you, Sire, to remember: The church is an anvil which has worn out many hammers. --Theodore Beza to the King of France.
[3] Blowin’ in the Wind, Bob Dylan. When this song was published in Sing Out! in June 1962, it had some Bob Dylan's comments, "Too many of these hip people are telling me where the answer is but oh I won't believe that. I still say it's in the wind and just like a restless piece of paper it's got to come down some ..."
[4] Barth CD, IV.2 [64.3] 264, [66.6] 599, IV.3 [71.3] 535.
[5] Barth CD IV.1 [59.2] 244.
[6] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 418.
[7] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 403, relying upon Martin Luther.
No comments:
Post a Comment