One aspect of the Old Testament texts during Lent is their insight into the human condition, which includes our rebellion, our iniquity, a sense of the pervasive influence of sin. The witness of scripture includes providing us insight into the situation we face with self, others, and God. Our capacity for delusion, to lie to ourselves, is profound enough that it can be a help to our maturing to have scripture pointing us to a problem we may not even know we have. Our actions can lead us to feel like we have put ourselves in despair, in which our distress has a death-like grip upon us. Our shame, revealing a general moral sense, and our guilt, revealing our sense of what a specific act says about us, have tremendous power. The conscience can afflict us. Such psychological and emotional reactions to our behavior show we have a strong moral sense. Circumstances can lead us to a strong encounter with ourselves. They can reveal our character to ourselves. They can be a window to the soul, and we do not like what we see. We need to die to the unreality of our self-perception, which is too often and illusion, a lie we from to ourselves and for others. Since we lie to ourselves so well, since our defense mechanisms are strong and get stronger with education and experience, we may not experience shame or guilt as much as we should. We need an honest look at the sickness of our condition. A prayerful and meditative approach can lead us to the truth about who we are. Even if we could be in a perfect place, a utopia, we would find a way to corrupt it. The depth of sinfulness reveals itself in small acts. An angry word, a selfish act, lustful meditations, inappropriate consumption of food and expenditure of wealth, and so on, can reveal who we are and what we value. If life comes from God, our tendency is to turn from God. The innocence and playfulness of children will yield to that moment when we have transgressed a limit set by parents, and our shame and guilt lead us to hide. We see, we delight in, and desire, that which is beyond the limit. Circumstances are tests that reveal who we are, and too often we are stubborn, obtuse, ungrateful, and fractious. We are anxious regarding our lives, which, while it can lead us to creativity, it often leads us toward such self-destructive behavior. Happiness secured through immoral means is an illusion and temporary. We think such behavior will promote life, but all our transgression does is promote death. Our shame and guilt lead us to fear, blame, and alienation from others and from God. The gap between who we are and whom we hope to be is vast. Any hope for authenticity has slipped away. We are so deceptive that religious practice become a fetish, a superficial expression, where our acts of devotion do not lead us to treating others ethically, which leads us to treat others with lack of regard and respect they deserve as human beings. Such proper action toward others will be loving and just. Religious practices need to come from sincere inward spiritual devotion. If they do not, they are part of the lie we are building about ourselves. We can even take scripture passages out of context and base our actions upon an unwise reading of the text, the nature of the people of God, and the nature of God. For example, the Lord promises to protect us, but we do not take the metaphor of protecting us from poisonous snakes as an opportunity to test God by picking up a venomous snake. We often engage in such twisted use of the biblical witness because of our fear and anxiety, our desire for security and something upon which we can rely. We can understand this because human life is full of danger. Yet, our desire for safe and secure places must not blind us to the reality that faithfulness to God may well expose us to more danger rather than less. We must never trivialize sin. At the same time, the pit and depths to which we have sunk must never lead us to give up. Our deepest longing as human beings, represented by the soul, become thirsty and hungry and desire satisfaction. Our confession leads to freedom from sickness and affliction, revealing that any attempt to conceal sin is useless and brings needless suffering. Silence and concealing become part of the sinfulness we must face regarding who we are. Confession is the opposite of concealing and remaining silent our sin, which are expressions of opposition to God, and thus leads to our freedom and healing. We turn to the Lord, despite our sin, for we recognize there is no help apart from God. Thus, we must never underestimate divine love and grace, which comes toward us even we have not been loyal to God. The Lord acts redemptively toward us when we have gone astray. We are in need for cleansing and forgiveness. If we are to experience liberation from guilt and healing of the damage our rebellion and sin have brought, it will be due to the working of grace and forgiveness. For God not to remember the ways we have turned from God and failed in our love and just behavior toward others means God will not act toward us based upon our wayward acts but based upon divine mercy. Such a decision by God leads to health and eternal life. We depend upon the covenantal benevolence of God. God is gracious, merciful, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and loyalty, qualities on which we must rely upon if our relationship with God is to continue. This quality of God leads toward our redemption, our ransom from that which enslaved us. This quality of God gives us a reason for hope, a hope whose basis derives from outside us, regarding our future. Such hope involves directing our lives toward a goal. The covenant with the Lord gives instruction and guidance in the ways the Lord would have the people of God to lead their lives. We can still receive much guidance from the covenant of the Lord with Israel in the simplicity of the Ten Commandments and in the development of wisdom. We can grant that human life has complexity, but too often we have made it so. We stir up the dust and complain we cannot see. We make our lives messy. We wrestle with an anxiety that lies just beneath the surface of our lives, although sometimes, our anxiety shouts at us. Our relationship with God may have moments of close friendship, in which we can intimately whisper our prayer, and our relationship may be such this moment that we feel the need to shout to the God who feels so distant. Yet, if the Lord is our light, then we have the help we need. Here is our stronghold as a people. Here is the reliable basis of our lives. The question before us is whether our story, which will include suffering, will be a redemptive story. Our confidence is that the Lord makes saints out of sinners, recognizing that every said has a past and every sinner has a future (Oscar Wilde). Even if all we have to offer is brokenness and strife, the Lord can make something beautiful of our lives. We have a choice between faith and fear. On the other side of the complexity of our lives is a simplicity of trust that provides comfort, solace, and strength. We can trust such divine presence whether in the “green pastures” and “still waters,” or in the “valley of the death-shadow.” Any lack we experience in life may be because we have closed our eyes to the ways God has provided for us. Such basic trust means we do not have to respond to life with obtuseness or rebelliousness. Given the challenges of life, our souls need restoration so that we do not grow tired of life. Death casts its shadow over our lives, so we need to make the most of the days we have. Even as we face death, we can have the confidence that the arms of the Lord embrace us. We do not face death alone. We honor the death of those close to us without surrendering to despair. We can trust the Lord to guide us through the most challenging of times. To choose faith is to face the future calmly and maturely in communion with God and the people of God. Amid so much ugliness, we can see a beauty that attracts us to the best of life and to the best of ourselves. Such beauty has gentleness and charm that attracts us to the true and the good. Approaching life in this way will open us to embrace the times of feasting. The faithful and covenantal love of the Lord will be with us throughout us throughout our days and will continue within the Infinite and Eternal reality of God.
Another aspect of the Old Testament texts during Lent is their presentation of the covenant of Israel with the Lord. Given who we are, we need a word from God to disclose who God is. In the Old Testament, the account of the various covenants steadily discloses who God is.
The covenant with Noah simply guarantees the continuation of earthly orders that God has made. God formalizes the relationship with Noah, his sons, and with every living thing, with a covenant (berit). Divine love embraces even the small creatures of this world. “All thy works shall praise thy name, in earth, and sky and sea.” (Reginald Heber, “Holy, Holy, Holy”). There is a theologically significant connection between God creating and God developing a covenant with Israel. A distinctive feature of this covenant is that God makes this covenant with all future generations of humanity. The covenant with Noah, the sign of which is the bow (qéshet, used both for the bow of a warrior and for the rainbow), involves the whole creation. The resting bow means that God is not against us, despite sin and judgment. Another distinctive feature of this covenant is that the only speaker is God. The other party has no response to make. Thus, God gives this covenant freely and graciously on behalf of a world that did not have to ask for it or earn it, or even respond to it.
The call and covenant with Abraham invite reflection on life as a journey. While God creates, humanity fails to honor God or each other, leading to increasing alienation that God seeks to heal. The saving history of Israel begins with the call of Abraham, the Mesopotamian ancestor who embarked upon a journey from modern-day Iraq to the land that would become Israel. The text offers no reason for the choice of Abram. The point of the call of Abram is to heal the breach between the Lord and the nations. The land to which the Lord will bring Abram will become a major theme of the Torah. Like the prophets to come, he will hear a word from the Lord, and he will express his doubt and anxiety as he and his wife aged and he does not have progeny, a major theme of the narrative of the Patriarchs. In the early narratives, the Lord has conversations with people like Adam and Eve, Cain, Noah, and now Abraham. Questions come natural to human beings, so we might as well bring them to God. Before the giving Torah, Abraham was righteous through his trust in the extravagant promise of the Lord. When centuries later the apostle Paul would focus upon salvation by faith in what God has done in Jesus Christ, he was focusing an aspect of his Jewish faith that had been present for centuries. With the use of animals, the Lord and Abram “cut” a covenant between them, Abraham declaring that may what happened to these animals happen to him if he breaks the covenant. He embraces the promise that he will have progeny and land before either are within sight. In another version of this covenant, its sign is circumcision.
God will disclose another aspect of who God through Moses. This covenant will come with the ritual of Passover, which is a family observance that remembers the origin of Israel in liberation from slavery in Egypt and with the smearing of blood on the walls seeks to avert evil from the household. The Lord chooses to work with Israel, fulfilling the promise to Abraham. The giving of this ritual of remembrance, the Lord is inviting the present generation to connect with its past. Another ancient ritual affirmed that the Lord was the owner of the land and that they owed offerings to the Lord, many of which were shared with the priests, who had no land. Part of that ritual reminded them of their humble beginning with Jacob as a wandering Aramean who journeyed to Egypt, whose descendants received harsh treatment, but whom the Lord delivered with displays of signs and wonders, bringing them into a land flowing with milk and honey. Our brief chronological time occurs within the context of a much larger divine plan. The first observance of Passover in the land at Gilgal acknowledged the disgrace, shame, guilt, and regret of slavery and the failures to trust the Lord in the wilderness. Along with liberation is the formation of a covenant at Sinai/Horeb, for which I have an extensive discussion of the Ten Commandments, which become the paradigm for the Deuteronomic History and its account of the breaking of the covenant by Israel that would lead to exile and the vision of a new covenant. Synonyms for Torah are law, decrees, precepts, commandments, or instruction. Wisdom and Torah increasingly overlap in the guidance they offer. The individual instructions revive the soul, make the simple wise, make the heart rejoice, and enlighten the eyes. Parallel to such thoughts is that the fear of the Lord is pure and the ordinances of the Lord are true and righteous. The torah brings delight, joy, and blessing to those who obey it. Torah is a revelation of the will of the Lord. Such a revelation by Lord is to be desired more than gold and is sweeter than honey. Listening to the Lord in this way brings life. without Torah, yes, we would still detect error. Yet, we are also naturally aware of our capacity for self-deception. In this sense, revelation provides a reference point outside us by which we can detect right and wrong. Torah commands honor of God in our worship, speech, and use of our time. We may wonder if respecting parents, the property of others, telling the truth, faithfulness to a spouse or other matters, are right, good, and moral. Torah does not wonder. Torah says Yes, such behavior deserves respect and fulfillment in our lives. Torah will not tell us everything we are to do with our lives, and Torah will not tell unambiguously what to do in every situation. However, Torah will provide broad knowledge of the type of person we are to become and discern what that type of person would do in this situation.
The covenant with King David and his descendants would be another significant disclosure of who God is, as the Lord adjusts to a changing situation for the people of the covenant. To the surprise of Samuel, the Lord chooses the youngest of a family to be the next king of Israel. The Spirit who hovered over the waters of chaos and brought order was the same Spirit who anointed King David. This Spirit will abide with the House of David forever.
One of the most remarkable and unique characteristics of the over-arching narrative we find in the Bible is the bonded relationship God voluntarily establishes with human beings. These special relationships receive legal standing by God through formal covenants between God and humans. The story of God’s “cutting a covenant” with us is the basic plot line of the Scriptures. Thus, God had a covenant with humanity after the flood through Noah. God established a covenant with Abraham and his family. God made a covenant with Israel at Sinai that they renewed in their assemblies during the period of the Judges. God made a covenant with the family of David. The result of this accumulation of covenants was that God gave gifts to Israel. God gave the gift of land. God gave the gift of law, establishing moral law, laws of purity, sacrificial laws, and dietary laws. God gave the gift of a city (Jerusalem), a Temple, and a king. Yet, instead of responding with thankful obedience, Israel broke each covenant. The experience of Israel was that it profoundly violated the covenant it had with God. So much so, in fact, that in the experience of exile God took away land, city, Temple, and king. Thus, the words of the prophet begin to introduce a new idea that will eventually have new covenant ramifications. Unlike the Mosaic covenant engraved upon stone tablets, God will put the law within them and upon their hearts.
Given the divine promise of land to Abraham and his descendants, given the affirmation of that promise in the election of Israel, and given the choice of King David and his descendants, who conquered Jerusalem and whose son built the Temple, the exile presented a theological challenge. Ezekiel would envision the exiled Jewish people as dead, dry bones, but received a vision of the life-giving Spirit giving life to the spiritually dead. II Isaiah will re-interpret this promise, which was needed because there were more descendants of King David, to apply to the Judeans who returned from exile. He democratized the covenant with the House of David. All members of the Judean commonwealth have royal status. As such, the nation becomes a mediator between the Lord and the nations. II Isaiah would envision the return to Judah as a new exodus out of bondage and toward the freedom of the people of God, only this time, instead of remembrance, they are to forget the past and look toward the new thing the Lord will do. There will be no Davidic King and there will initially be no Temple. Rather than romanticizing the past, they need to become open to something new.
If you want to get philosophical, here is the “Ship of Theseus” problem. In ancient times, there was a ship, called the “Theseus.” As the years wore on, the Theseus started getting weak and creaky. They removed the old boards, put them into a warehouse, and replaced with new ones. Then, the masts started tottering, and soon the owners warehoused and replaced them. In this way, after 50 years, this ship now has all new boards, masts, and everything. The question then arises: Is the ship in the harbor, now called S2, the same ship as the ship that was in the harbor 50 years ago (S1, for convenience)? In other words, is S2 really the “Theseus”? Applied to the Old Testament, the assumption is that with all the changes from Abraham through the post-exilic period, the answer is affirmative. The New Testament will also give an affirmative answer in the sense that the same divine being who called Abraham, who revealed the covenantal name Yahweh, who guided Israel, also offered a new revelation and covenant in Jesus Christ.
Another aspect of the Old Testament texts during Lent is their examination of suffering with the servant of the Lord and the saving plan of God. This occurs through the poetry of the psalms and through II Isaiah. Although such reflections contribute to the philosophical question of theodicy, they do not provide an answer. They do suggest that in this world God has made, suffering can be the means through which God works to bring liberation, healing, and redemption. The exile of the Jewish people and the suffering it occasioned led to such theological reflections. The suffering of some of the prophets, especially Jeremiah, also paved the way for such insights. Such reflections in the Old Testament overlapped with the suffering of Jesus, giving the New Testament many reasons to reflect upon these texts as a way to understand what God was doing in the life and suffering of Jesus.
God offers direct help in a manner that inspires us to offer joyful surrender to God, who can overcome all afflictions. Death is a formidable power that wants to overwhelm human life. The goodness of the Lord, the faithful love of the Lord, underlies the summons to offer praise and thanks in prayer. Even when we breach the covenant, the Lord remains faithful to it. The Lord is one who rescues and honors the unlikely. Thus, in a memorable image, the one rejected has become prominent and irreplaceable (Matthew 21:42, Acts 4:11, and I Peter 2:7), Jesus Christ has is (ἀκρογωνιαίου, Ephesians 2:20). A popular hymn from the 600s and translated from the Latin by John Mason Neale (1818-1866) begins with the notion that God has made Christ the sure foundation, head, and cornerstone, the chosen one, and precious, binding all the church in one. In the act of the Lord, worshippers recognize the marvelous quality of the act. A poet can write of suffering through a prolonged illness, persecuted by enemies, and abandoned by friends. He seeks the face of God when confronted with the threat of violent death. He wonders if his life has meaning or value. The crisis he faces causes pain in psyche and body. He is physically wasting away. His shame increases as he suffers from the scorn and reproach of others. Shame suggests that who you are does not measure up to the standards of those who shame you. You have not just done something the other dislikes, but who you are is not sufficient to be included in their group. He faints and is not useful for anything. As in Jeremiah 20:10, he feels the terror all around. Yet, he turns to trust (batah) in the Lord, where he feels safe and secure, placing himself confidently into God’s caring hands, relying assuredly on him in threatening times. Regardless of the shame and exclusion he has experienced, the Lord is his God, and that is enough. His destiny, future, fate, and every moment of his life are in the refuge God ahs provided. Reminiscent of Numbers 6:24-26 and Psalm 4:6, he wants the face of the Lord to shine upon him, since he is a servant of the Lord, and save him by the loyal, covenant-love, unfailing love, faithfulness, faithful care (hesed) of the Lord. Another poet must face his recent suffering and impending death, but he relies upon the Lord for help and deliverance. He can rely upon the Lord because the Lord is gracious, righteous, and merciful. The poet places himself before the Lord as a servant. The Lord has been good to him, and he wants to express his gratitude. He will lift the cup of the saving help of the Lord and call upon the name of the Lord, this phrase becoming significant for Christian liturgy regarding Holy Communion. The cup is a libation celebrating the deliverance of the poet that often accompanies the thank offering, although it could be a simple metaphor as if offering a toast to the Lord that he will publicize the great deeds of the Lord. He then stresses that death is costly and therefore, the death of the faithful is grievous (yakar, some translations say “precious”) in the sight of the Lord. Death is costly because it breaks off all relationship between the Lord and the people. The psalmist gives voice to a sentiment that has become one of the most used phrases at funerals. The Lord does not wish those who adhere to the Lord to die. Therefore, the poet is assured that the Lord keep him alive. He identifies himself with an epithet of extreme humility as a servant of the Lord, even the child of your serving your serving girl. Here is the best the psalmist can offer in gratitude for the good the Lord has brought into his life. He will become the servant of the Lord for the rest of his life. The Lord has loosed his bonds, referring to his illness or to the constriction caused by the situation in which he finds himself.
Another poet (Psalm 22) can express profound anguish of mind and religious doubt and conflict. The writer is in shock to the point of expressing itself in physical symptoms due to the lack of response from God and the scorn of non-believers. Throughout the psalm, the writer portrays himself as a faithful worshiper of Yahweh. This faithfulness is the ground of his appeal to God for help. If you want to know why the question of theodicy will never have a definitive answer for us, here is the fundamental reason. If you want to know why atheism will always be a valid response to our experience of life on this planet, meditate upon this psalm. Suppose you have an experience in which you want God to speak or to act so much that it hurts. Suppose you look at an historical event, such as the Holocaust, and ponder why God did not stop that. In other words, the silence of God becomes deafening. If God is silent during the horrors of personal life and human history, then the silence can say a great deal. Belief in God is an affirmation that life triumphs over death, that hope triumphs over despair, that light triumphs over darkness, and that love triumphs over apathy. Yet, what would happen if the silence of God amid tragedy means that death, despair, darkness, and apathy are the final word this universe has to say to humanity? Thus, even one faithful to the Lord can utter a cry of despair, aloneness, and separation from God. Doubt is an important experience in going deeper with God. Adherents need to be unafraid of doubt. Doubt may lead us to see what is truly reliable. The poet raises the question of how the faithful deal with the silence of God. Jesus had that experience from the cross. He had affirmed the presence and reality of God in his healing, casting out of demons, and in his sayings and parables, yet, now, in the last hours of his life, his heavenly Father was silent. The fact that he could feel the thoroughly human emotion of despair, despite his divine nature, is both a scandal and a miracle by which Christians affirm the dual nature of Christ. Even as the Son of the Father, he experienced the silence of God. In fact, in the closing hours of his life, the silencing of his Father is deafening. He wants God to help and hear. He wants God to speak and act. God is silent. He is not blaming God. He is not asking why God did or did not do something. He is asking what God is amid his suffering. Part of his suffering is the desertion by people, who have become predators. His body is showing signs of dying. People are arranging to divide up his possessions when he dies. Despite all this, discovering a deeper layer of devotion, the poet moves toward hope. The Lord has already answered him. He expresses belief that the world will steadily turn toward the worship of the Lord. The Lord has granted deliverance, to which the poet will testify. The poet invites us to embrace the ambiguity of a human life, the multi-layered reality in which human life consists of. Thus, this Psalm, beginning with so much anguish, ends with an ever-widening circle of praise to the Lord. We need to embrace both the threat of nothingness and the fullness of being both the abyss and the promise of life.
The servant of the Lord accomplishes his mission by speech, suggesting his prophetic role. Commitment to that mission is costly. Although the servant suffers, he remains obedient. This suggests that anyone could expect opposition and criticism if one remains dedicated to a mission to which the Lord has called. In this case, the people of the Lord in every generation and culture have a prophetic role which will lead to opposition and suffering. Receiving a divine summons, divine power will be present to fulfill the divinely given mission. This prophet will teach with words, but he will also teach with his life. If that is true of the people of the Lord, the life of Jesus bears witness to its truth as well. One who enters the school of Christ will not have done so in vain. The servant is a teacher, always listening to what the Lord God (‘adonai Yahweh) teaches him. Yet, this teacher experiences opposition in ways that caused the Gospel writers to use his images to describe the final suffering of Jesus. Yet, the servant remains firm because he is confident the Lord God will help him. People cannot shame him because the Lord has honored him. However, in important judicial language, the Lord vindicates or acquits the prophet, showing that the servant-prophet is righteous and has endured suffered as an innocent. The image is that of a next of kin who stands at his side during legal proceedings. The Servant challenges his opponents (or is willing to accept their challenge) to a court battle. The Servant will not allow anyone to thwart him from his God-given task due to the disgrace that such horrific opposition would usually engender in a tight-knit community; nor will he have to face the shame of defeat due to failure to complete his God-given task. With God, he can withstand those withering attacks. If the Lord acquits him, then no one else can bring a charge of guilt. The rhetoric recurs in Romans 8:33-34.
We also need to have the courage to explore our role in inflicting suffering and evil upon the servant of the Lord. The people of God have their role in perpetuating violence against the Servant, and therefore the continuation of suffering and evil. It was natural and insightful for the New Testament to point to overlapping themes in the suffering servant of II Isaiah with the life of Jesus, especially since Jesus saw himself as the servant of the Lord along these lines. [1]
The Lord prospers and exalts this servant, contrasting sharply with Israelites who were astonished at his suffering and disfigurement. The servant does not receive honor through his affliction, for the wrath of God has touched him. He receives divine punishment for sin, but not for any sin he committed, but the sins of others. The curse that lies upon others rests upon the servant. We are shocked at the career of this servant. This innocent servant rescues others from suffering by bearing the suffering due to them on himself. He had humble origins. Because others mistreated him, he lacked beauty. The one suffering from divine anger was dangerous to look upon. The servant suffered on behalf of those looking upon him with shock. In doing so, he suffering vicariously for the guilty so that they could escape punishment. He bore their infirmities and diseases, yet they considered him an object of divine wrath. We, the people of God, looked upon the servant in this way. We do not realize that his wounds were for our transgressions or that God crushed him for our iniquities. Yet, it is through his punishment and bruises that we receive healing. We are typical of sheep who have gone astray and turned to our own way. The Lord places this iniquity upon the servant. There was a perversion of justice in human courts, but the servant remains silent, like a lamb led to the slaughter. With justice perverted, they lead him to his death, struck down for the transgression of the people of God. They bury him with the condemned criminals who do not receive an honorable burial. His tomb was with the rich. He received this judgment, even though he had done no violence and spoke truthfully. The will of the Lord was to crush him. The servant dies by violence, charging him with the crimes of the wicked, burying him with criminals, showing their low regard for the servant. These few verses have an enormous influence on primitive Christian ideas of the vicarious expiatory meaning of the death of Jesus “for many,” meaning for all. Jesus died as one rejected by his people. In the Jewish tradition, one can find support for the understanding of his death as an expiation for his people only in this passage. The circumstances of the death of Jesus provided a reason to go back to this prophetic passage since his people despised and rejected Jesus while God justified him with his resurrection.[2] The Lord speaks the final word on the life of the servant, vindicating his life with the paradox of resurrection. Out of the anguish he has experienced the servant shall see light and find satisfaction by his "knowledge," meaning the will of the Lord, something like the renewal of Israel that Ezekiel 37 envisions. The recovery and wellbeing of the servant is significant. The dramatic movement of the poem is to move into the abyss and then out of it into wellbeing and triumph. Such a movement is adaptable for to the Christian message. The righteous servant shall make many righteous by bearing their iniquities. The prophet compares the death of the Servant to the victim of an atonement sacrifice, as the guilt offering. The Lord delivers the Servant from death and from the charge of guilt because he made himself a guilt-offering. He takes on himself the guilt of others and accepts the treatment due the guilty. Servant bore the sin of fellow Israelites and made intercession for transgressors. For the Christian, the expiatory efficacy of the death of the servant is for humanity. The end of the servant is vindication and success. God honors what the world does not. [3]
The epistle lessons come from Paul, Peter, and the writer to the Hebrews.
Paul (Romans 4:1-5, 13-17) explores the faith to which now calls Christians as something like the faith of Abraham and the fulfillment of the promise to Abraham. The universal thrust of his message rests upon his insight that faith rather than the covenantal law of Israel justified Abraham before God. In that sense, the Gentile mission of Paul has its root in the calling of Abraham. Through his faith, he becomes the patriarch of us all. Abraham experienced rightness with God through faith, and not through either Law or circumcision. The broken character of the relationship between God and humanity is not one that humanity can heal. He is arguing against rabbinic interpretation that made the Torah so significant for rightness with God that, even though Abraham lived before the giving the Torah, he obeyed the Torah. Abraham had faith that God could life to the dead, meaning a child through an elderly couple, thereby having hope that God would fulfill the promise when it was not rational to do so. The desire of Abraham for progeny matched the promise of God to him. By implication, he had the type of faith that believes God rose Jesus from the dead. The second of the 18 benedictions, which Paul would have known says “Remember us unto life, O king, who delights in life. Who resembles You, O King, who orders death and restores life, and causes salvation (Yeshua) to spring forth? You are faithful to revive the dead. Blessed art thou, O L-rd, who revives the dead.” Christ is the clarification of this plan of God. Only the creator can awaken the dead, while resurrection from the dead shows what it means to be the creator. God will also consider our faith today in God who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead as righteousness. This Jesus was handed over to death for our trespasses, which suggests expiation, releasing us from the damaging consequences of our actions. Faith involves accepting as applied to oneself the promise of God. The promise addresses us and reaches us. Such faith gives rise to hope, showing that hope rests upon faith. While the promise connects positively with human desire, we cannot accomplish on our own and by our own action our salvation, the wholeness and fulfillment of our existence, its identity with its destiny to be truly itself.
Paul will draw out the consequences of this new perspective on faith (Romans 5:1-11). Paul shifts to legal terminology. “Justified” (Δικαιωθέντες) in Roman law refers to a judge who knows the accused person is guilty but pronounces the defendant free anyway. We might think of it as a pardon. Human beings receive this pardon through the event or act of faith (πίστεως). The death of Christ has the expiatory effect of removing the reasonable consequences of human sin in eschatological judgment from God. Human beings can experience the effects of the event of expiation through the response of faith that brings the person into a new covenant. The death of Christ breaks the vicious circle of act-consequence that would have meant the destruction of humanity. Since God gives us this grace, it represents the divine self-giving. We can stand or abide in this grace (χάριν). Christ brings us close God, so close that we share in the hope (ἐλπίδι) of the glory (δόξης) of God. The glory of God is human destiny, created as we are in the divine likeness. The Spirit is the personal divine presence that the pardoned believer enjoys. We have here the assurance of fellowship with God in the link between love and Spirit. Christian love is participation in the love God has for the world. [4] While only the eschatological future of God will consummate this revelation of divine love, the gift of the Holy Spirit makes believers already certain of it. What Paul points us toward is an event that is not natural, and it does not emerge out of human experience. Rather, this event is a divine disclosure that reveals the true and the good. This event calls us to turn toward it and orient our lives around it. This event becomes an encounter with the truth rather than a calm discovery of it. The encounter with this event involves the significance of an event of long ago, but is reality involves the subjective encounter with the Holy Spirit. As much as we are part of a process, a system, particularity remains an important part of that system. Natural history has significant moments that alter the history of planets, which is a parallel to significant moments of the intellectual history of humanity that have discovered truths that have moved the thirst for a communal life that respects the worth and dignity of others. Paul points us to an event that we did not discover, but that God revealed, which defines the nature of his version of particularity. The scandal of particularity in Paul is that God has revealed what we could not have discovered. In an event within human history, Christ died for these persons too weak to save themselves. The event is a purposeful act of God. The event has a vicarious character. The death of Christ and his obedience through suffering is how the love and grace of God shows itself to the world. God demonstrated love for the enemy when God sent Jesus to give his life for the sinner, the weak, the rebellious, the enemy of God. The sacrifice of Christ's blood justifies sinners to God. This justification (δικαιωθέντες) for Paul provides the way that Christians receive the gift of salvation (σωθησόμεθα) from the wrath or anger of God, moving from the sphere of legal terminology to the sphere of relationships, reconciling (κατηλλάγημεν) us to God, giving us peace and fellowship.
Paul will consider the role of Adam, who represents us all before God and with others (Romans 5:12-19). Adam shows the universal predicament of humanity, in trouble with God and with each other. Each of us keep making the same boring and unimportant decision to depart from what we know to be true and good. Adam sums up the history of humanity. Adam sums up the meaning or meaninglessness of this history. Human history is Adamic history. It begins in and with his history and its judgment is that it continuously corresponds to this history. With innumerable variations, it repeats the history of Adam. It re-enacts the scene in the garden. Caught in this endless cycle repeated in the life of every human being, humanity is in a prison. Even the giving of the law did not help, for Israel continued the disobedience begun in Adam. Israel continued the story of human rebellion. Christ reveals a truth concerning humanity that only his future beauty (glory) of his coming will fully reveal. Christ liberates us from the prison and opens us to the beauty of a future life in the Spirit, which will be the theme of the next chapters. This beautiful truth about humanity is present now for those with faith but awaits in hope its future declaration in the coming of Christ in glory. Paul will then affirm that Christ has brought a balance to the cosmic scale of justice in that the trespass (παράπτωμα) or sin (ἁμαρτήσαντος) of Adam brought the condemnation (κατάκριμα) of death to all but the gift of the grace of God through Christ has brought justification (δικαίωμα). Paul writes in archetypical language of the eschatological destiny of humanity as if already fulfilled in Jesus Christ.[5] Jesus was obedient to his mission in a way that leads to justification (δικαίωσιν) and life. Paul contrasts the disobedience (παρακοῆς) of Adam with that can now describe humanity as sinners (ἁμαρτωλοὶ) so the obedience of Jesus makes humanity righteous (δίκαιοι). His argument moves logically toward the destiny of human redemption of humanity and therefore all creation. Just as Adam, the head and symbol of humanity, by his disobedience involved all people in guilt, bondage, and death, so Christ by his obedience qualifies as the head of a new humanity - a new creation - in which are justification, redemption from the power of sin, and victory over death.
Paul will draw our attention to our finite existence as oriented toward death, but that our decision to value this finite existence improperly intensifies our move toward death (Romans 8:6-11). We do not see possibilities beyond the limitations and inabilities of our finite existence. The law is the expression of the will of God, but the weakness of our orientation toward finite existence reveals our hostility toward the things of God. Since God is the source of life, and the law reveals our tendency to turn from God, the effect of our orientation toward finite existence is death. He contrasts the weakness of this orientation with that of an orientation toward the Spirit, which is life, peace, and friendship with God. We can crucify our orientation toward our finite existence, but it will take a lifetime, just as we can experience transformation of the orientation of our lives toward the Spirit, although this will take a lifetime. We stand now between our past justification in the cross and our future salvation and redemption, but the present is full because of the eschatological gift of the Spirit, who provisionally imparts life and peace now. The Spirit personally directs us toward fulfillment of our destiny. Paul passes easily from the influence of the Holy Spirit upon the human spirit that leads to the higher Christian life. The Spirit of God continually resides within the believer so that the influence of the Spirit can mature and be productive in the life of the Christian. The one “in Christ” also abides, resides, and dwells in the Spirit. The Spirit grants the immediacy of relationship to the Son and the Father, granting the believer freedom of the children of God. Such living by faith brings one into fellowship with Christ and therefore lifts one beyond the concerns of a life focused upon finite existence. This residing of the Spirit in us makes possible the uniqueness of who we are to find entry into the action of God in reconciling the world and enables our participation in the movement of the reconciling love of God toward the world. [6] Thus, to clarify who the Spirit is, the Spirit is the life-giving Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead. This life-giving Spirit resides within us and will give life to our dying bodies. This indwelling Spirit is thus the driving force and the source of new vitality for Christian life. The tension introduced by the Spirit in the life of the believer is a tension that arises because the Infinite embraces the finite, that transcendence embraces our immanent experience of the world. If we close ourselves off from transcendence, if we do not feel its pull, then we will not have the type of tension of which Paul writes. Some people can rest with an objective description of the world. They are content with that. Yet, human language itself pushes us beyond such mere description, seeking to express thoughts and feelings that are beyond words. Life is more than what a collection of atoms and cells. For Paul, Christ is the answer to that which we find so difficult to name and for which we have difficulty to hope for humanity and for our world. The Infinitude and transcendence that embraces us is the presence of the Spirit, who will dwell within us and walk with us if by faith open our lives to this power. Paul could write this way because he was one of whom God blessed with a powerful experience of the grace of forgiveness and the vision of the peace and reconciliation God intends in Christ. Most believers may have a far more ordinary account of the indwelling and guiding work of the Spirit in their lives that will suit the uniqueness of their lives.
Paul will contrast the righteousness from law and the righteousness from faith (Romans 10:8b-13). The word (ῥῆμά) of faith, the gospel, is close as our hearts and mouths, through which we remember and make known the righteousness that comes from faith. This word is in sharp contrast with the distance and difficulty of the law. Thus, if you confess (ὁμολογήσῃς, to commit an act of honest-to-God speech, publicly coming clean about what the truth is) with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe (πιστεύσῃς) in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved (σωθήσῃ). For one believes with the heart and so is justified (δικαιοσύνην). The confession of Jesus as Lord was a fundamental article of belief in the early church.[7] The confession of Jesus as Lord was required, perhaps in creedal formulation, for admission to baptism, membership in the church and access to the Eucharist. The cause of this public profession is the prior internal event of believing that God raised Jesus from the dead. Such conviction resides authentically in the heart and issues faithfully from the mouth. Inner faith forthrightly receives voice.
Paul develops a theology of the cross (I Corinthians 1:18-25). The bridge between the event of Jesus as the Christ in its time and our appropriation of that event in our time is the message and proclamation of the gospel. Time does not trap Christ in the past, for the word or message of the cross is the vehicle through which Christ becomes present in our time. Here is an amazing claim for the power of language. The saving power of God comes in something as vulnerable and foolish preaching. If preaching has this power, it has the power to break the grip of sin and bring us to God. The cross discloses the folly of the wisdom and strength of this world. One of the paradoxical statements of Paul is that the folly of the cross is wisdom. God has abandoned the wisdom of this world. Paul delights in the paradox of the cross and how its offense and weakness reveal the power of God, thus exposing the foolishness of this age. He proposes a sharp distinction between the wisdom contained in the plan of God and the wisdom of human beings. Human beings did not know God through their philosophical or religious search, so God decided through the foolishness of apostolic proclamation to save those who respond to that preaching with faith or trust in its validity and truth. The danger of all preaching and apologetics is to falsify the gospel by presenting in an acceptable and tolerable form for the current age. The Moment of revelation places Jew and Gentile on the same footing. Both conflict with revelation! To their credit, both Jew and Gentile want to know God. Their inability to know God by their chosen means to do so is part of the divine plan. We will need to trust something beyond our ability to control or toward which we could reason. We will have to direct our attention decidedly toward that which is not of our making to learn who God is. If revelation conformed to our expectations, we would hardly have needed revelation. Some Jews expected signs from Jesus (Matthew 12:38). They wanted tangible demonstrations of power. Such a sign would be dramatic intervention in the sky and the earth. The Jews demand a victorious Messiah. The contrasting desire of the Greek for wisdom is a demand for an approach to the ineffable that is intellectually cogent and philosophically sound. They want any talk of God to have intellectual respectability.The Greeks wanted to weigh the pros and cons of a new system. Paul is combating an inflated view of wisdom and knowledge. Human knowledge creates the obstacle here. If one measures revelation by the standards of human reason, revelation will come up short. To put it another way, we do not need revelation to teach us what we can learn through experience and reasoning. If revelation occurs in the cross, then it moves against human presumption. The cross moves against our natural tendencies. It refuses to conform to our standards of experience or reasoning. Revelation in the cross stresses what God has done there rather than that which we can know through the exercise of our reason. They want divine truths in the same way they get scientific truths. They want to observe and come to their conclusions. The demand for logic and reasons can blind one from seeing the moment of revelation. The apostolic proclamation is an offense to the Torah, and foolishness to those who think nothing significant can happen through something so vulnerable and prone to misunderstanding as preaching.
Paul will also draw lessons from baptism and the Lord’s Supper drawn from the exodus experience of Israel (I Corinthians 10:1-13). Sin is unoriginal as it uses the tests of life to draw the people of God into disobedient behavior. In referring to the wilderness experience of early Israelites as “our ancestors,” Paul is connecting the present generation of Christians into the history of the people of God as shown in the Old Testament. The church adopts the history of Israel as part of its history as the people of God. In connecting them with yesterday, he is showing how yesterday affects them today and how their decisions will affect tomorrow. That generation of early Israelites had the symbolism of passing through water, the Red Sea, and receiving spiritual food, manna and quail, both of which anticipate the presence of Christ, just as the church possesses the water of baptism and the sharing of the Lord’s Supper, which symbolize the presence of Christ today, yet that generation of early Israelites fell into sin, and the Corinthian congregation risks doing the same. They open themselves to the judgment of God, just as the early Israelites did. Despite the tendency of many in Corinth to view themselves as spiritually superior, the risk failing the tests of life today. Yet, part of God's faithfulness is not to allow us to encounter circumstances that we cannot withstand. Yet, the overall point is that God can still overthrow them. The disclosure of truth in Christ means that the truth was present all along in the history of Israel, and by extension in the history of all cultures. The church has the responsibility of witnessing to this truth and even naming it, given its hidden quality.
Paul will also explain the received tradition of the Lord’s Supper (I Corinthians 11:23-26, along with Mark 14:22-26, Matthew 26:26-30, Luke 22:14-23). He received it from the Lord, and therefore not from his Jewish tradition or another apostle, thereby heightening the importance of what he is about to say. This tradition, stemming from the evening before the death of Jesus, forms the basis of the Christian celebration of the Lord’s Supper and therefore of Christian worship in general. In this sense, “institution” by Jesus himself is basic to the celebration. It ought to be practiced in a way that reminds us of the communal and inclusive nature of the church. By Thursday night, the Passover meal, Jesus knew his time on earth was at a close. He shared a final meal with his disciples. The purpose of the story is to relate what Jesus said and did in the interests of faith and worship in these last hours.[8] Historically, they celebrate a Passover meal. However, Jesus re-interprets its symbolism with the words of institution. Remarkably, the Lord, who experienced betrayal this night, provided for others when he gave his disciples bread and cup, in the context of a prayer of thanksgiving. This meal was for others. In fact, as symbols of the self-giving of Jesus in this moment, food and drink are particularly appropriate. Food and drink do not exist for themselves but for other living creatures. They surrender their own existence to enter the lives of others. Food and drink offer themselves so that others may live.[9] Paul will stress that like the bread he broke on that night, his body is “for you,” meaning “for” the recipients and present to them,[10] emphasizing the sacrifice of the life of Jesus was for others. Paul and Luke will emphasize that Jesus gave a command for the continuation of this act in remembrance of Jesus. In emphasizing the wine as his blood of the covenant, Paul and Luke emphasizing “new,” he says that his disciples are not establishing a new people of God, [11] separating them from the rest of the Jewish people by their confession of Jesus.[12]Matthew will add this this pouring out of his life is for the forgiveness of sin. If the body and blood for us refer to the life of Jesus offered in his death, the decisive event in the Supper is not this recollection, but present participation in the fruit of this sacrifice. Paul adds that as often as they drink in this way, indicating this act has already become a regular part of their communal life, they are to do so in remembrance of Jesus. “Remembrance,” by which Paul connects with both bread and cup, links the Supper with the atoning death of Christ, not simply as recollection with the remote past, but a presentation and re-presentation of the paschal mystery of the death and resurrection of Jesus and therefore the self-representing of Jesus Christ by the Spirit.[13] As the disciples partake of the bread, they participate in the death of Jesus, and as they partake of the cup as the climax of the meal the focus shifts to the redemptive sacrifice and anticipates the return of the Son of Man. Each occasion of the Supper of the Lord is the Messianic banquet of the revealed reign of God, the fullest form of the fellowship of Christians with the Lord now revealed to them, and an anticipation of final revelation of the inaugurated in the resurrection.[14] When we look at the meals of Jesus in the gospels, when we particularly note the miraculous feeding in Mark 8:1-10=Matthew 15:32-39, and note his reference in parables to the banquet, we can see the importance of the eschatological fellowship of the reign of God. The sacrifice of Jesus begins this night. He offered himself to his followers and to the world as the savior. That death opened a relationship with God that has spread throughout every generation and every culture. Our sins do not have to separate us forever from God. In fact, we know that God is not gleefully rejecting us because of our sins. This sacrifice gives us the most vital information we need concerning God. Yet, we become accustomed to it, that we assume the truth of it. God wants us to have a friendship with God. Jesus is going to his death as pioneer who opens the way of life for all.
Paul will make it clear that because of the cross, Christians need to look upon the world differently than they did before (II Corinthians 5:16-6:20). The present is different from the past because of the cross. Paul had thought of Jesus in a human way, as an opponent to the Torah as Pharisees understood it. Even admirers of Jesus of Nazareth may have thought of him as a healer, exorcist, or an exceptional rabbi. The cross means we no longer view Jesus in such ways. Only in the transition through the death of his individual existence as man is Jesus the Son. His human individuality has the definitiveness, not as its particularity endures, but only as he offers it up for the sake of God and in the service of the coming of the reign of God. By accepting the death of his existence, Jesus made room for that of others. Others in their individual particularity can share in the filial relation to God and the inheritance of the reign of God only through the death of Jesus and through acceptance of their own death for the sake of God and the reign of God.[15] As Paul refers to those who are “in Christ,” he suggests an intimacy between believers and Christ that leads to the “already” of a new creation, so they are not look upon themselves in the same way as they did before, for the old is passing away and the new is coming, especially as they embrace their new vocation in becoming Christians. Paul draws upon the language of the political sphere to say in Christ and because of the cross, God is reconciling (καταλλάξαντος) the world to God, disclosing the love of God for us. Therefore, as a defense of the ministry of Paul and his team, their ministry is one of reconciliation, which becomes central to vocation of all Christians of the church. In the language of a financial transaction, God does not count our trespasses against us, by which God entrusts to Paul and his team the message of reconciliation. A change in relationship occurred between God and the world. The primary actor is God, but Paul emphasizes the role the servants of Christ play in this reconciliation. God needs witnesses to what God has done. The passage stresses that reconciliation has already occurred. Thus, messengers such as Paul and his associates do not bring about such reconciliation. God has reached out and restored the relationship between human and divine. God reconciles humanity and forgives the sins of everyone. The Christian charge from God is to preach and teach this universal reconciliation. The reconciliation of the world has taken place in the death of Christ, even though the Spirit completes it in believers. The missionary message of the apostles unfolds and brings home to all people significance of this reconciliation. God, by means of the human judges, not only made Jesus to be sin but also had him bear in our place, and not merely in that of his Jewish judges or the Jewish people, the penalty that is the proper penalty of sin. The reason for this is that the proper penalty of sin follows from its inner nature, death as the consequence of separation from God.[16] In this situation of condemnation and execution, Jesus, whom through the resurrection God showed to be innocent, bore death as the consequence of our sin, thereby effecting representation in the concrete form of a change of place between the innocent and the guilty. The innocent suffered the penalty of death, which, as the harmful result of sin, is the fate of those in whose place Christ died. The vicarious penal suffering that is vicarious suffering of the wrath of God at sin rests on the fellowship that the Son accepted with all of us as sinners and with our fate as such. This link is the basis on which the death of Jesus can count as expiation for us. Without this vicarious penal suffering, the expiatory function of the death of Jesus is unintelligible. .[17] Perhaps Theodoret of Cyrus, a fifth-century bishop, best captured the spirit of this paradox when he wrote, “Christ was called what we are in order to call us to be what he is.” Thus, in Christ, we become the righteousness of God. Paul emphasizes that the atonement is the work of God. God takes the human situation of rebellion and missing the mark into the life of the Triune God. Only in this way can humanity become the righteousness of God as God makes humanity a covenant partner with God. Paul is warning his readers that they are in danger of having accepted his message in vain, so he urges that now is their moment for salvation. He points to the suffering he and his team are experiencing as validation of the truth of their message.
The context of a profound Christological statement by Paul is to provide support for his exhortation that his readers live by the example Christ set Philippians 2:5-11). Another significant aspect of this text is that as a hymn and an affirmation of faith it shows the earliest Christian communities felt a need to express that which unites them before God in a fixed text. Although Paul shows he could form exalted prose, as in I Corinthians 13, most scholars think this text is a hymn from the Antioch congregation. It does not represent just the thought of Paul, but that the Christological convictions of the first generation of believers. Since Christ is central to the community, his example will add persuasiveness to his argument. As a Pharisee, Paul would have appealed to the Torah to provide such an exhortation to behave a certain way, but as one whom Christ has called, his appeal is to the pattern provided by Christ, who looked past his personal interest to the interests of others. He shows that Christ subjected himself to the limits of a human life to become Savior. Christ becomes an example of how Christians are to submit to each other. Christ willingly submits to the will of God. Its movement from a state of humiliation, based upon the pre-existence of the Son, toward a state of exaltation in the resurrection and ascension, form the basis of what would become Christological tradition. The unique aspect of Christ is that he was fully divine in that he was in the form (μορφῇ), image, and likeness of God. While Adam took advantage of his formation in the likeness and image of God to become independent of God. He grasped at his destiny as if it were prey he needed to catch, instead of the gift of God it was. We can grasp at our destiny through acts of religious devotion that hide who we really are and we can grasp at our destiny through our emancipation from religious bonds. He sought to be judge of right and wrong. The Son set aside the special privileges of his divinity, his fellowship with the Father and the Spirit, and for the sake of humanity, as the Son he emptied (ἐκένωσεν) himself throughout the historical life of Jesus of Nazareth in service to others, a dramatic example of this being the washing of the feet of the disciples (John 13:5-17), accepting the finitude and temporality of human beings. Such emptying of himself shows both the distinction and the subordination of the Son to the Father. Further, not considering his participation in the divine life as his goal, he took the form (μορφὴν) of a slave, a form not originally his own, was born in human likeness (ὁμοιώματι), and was found in human form (σχήματι) or appearance. His identity with humanity occurs while he remains united with divine life. To say it philosophically, the self-emptying of the Son becomes the path for the self-actualizing of the deity of the Trinitarian God in relation to the world and comes into being through this self-actualizing.[18] In such self-offering and self-humiliation, the Son remains divine, showing that God does not become a stranger to God by this process of self-emptying in Jesus of Nazareth. To say it personally and devotionally, the Trinitarian God shows humanity what God is like by showing up in the one who lived his life as a servant, Jesus of Nazareth. The Son sets aside the equality of divine life with Father and Spirit, but through his obedience during his earthly life remains the Son. The fullness and completeness of his obedience reveals Jesus as the pre-existent Son. The contrast with Adam, who forfeited his fellowship with God by disobedience and hiding from God, becomes complete as Jesus lived his life in fellowship with the divine life by his humbling (ἐταπείνωσεν) and his obedience (ὑπήκοος), his submission to the will of the Father and living his life in the power of the Spirit. As the Son lived in obedience to the Father, he set himself apart from humanity and in the process showed what human beings can become. He states in poetic form here what he argued in Romans 512ff, that the course of the life of Jesus of Nazareth was one of obedience, which set him in sharp contrast with Adam. His obedience as a human being reverses the effect of the disobedience of Adam. The humble and obedient Son sheds light upon the original situation of Adam and therefore our human nature and our destiny in relation to God. Thus, the self-emptying life of the Son is an expression of divinity, it is what God is like in this free expression of love. The Son shows the true essence of divinity. It also means that the divine life as the Son is hidden in the form of a servant. The extreme form this self-emptying took as the suffering and death of the cross, fulfilling the poetic expression of the suffering servant in Isaiah 52-53, as the servant willingly undergoes suffering and humiliation for others. The cross is the true meaning of what it means to be God as self-giving love. The solidarity of the Son with the Father and his solidarity with humanity leads to the reconciliation and redemption of the world. The Incarnation of God in Jesus of Nazareth is a path of humiliation, servanthood, obedience, submission, even to the point of the dehumanization, ugliness, helplessness, and abandonment of the cross. The event of the cross in the being of God is both trinitarian and personal, and as such properly leads us to re-think traditional notions of the immutability and impassibility of the divine nature, for the cross forces us to reflect upon death occurring in God. [19] Paul then describes the path of the exaltation of the Son in his resurrection and ascension. His exaltation confirms that he lived in obedience to the mission God gave him. It confirms that he was the obedient Son of the Father.[20] Only his resurrection from the dead gave the Crucified the dignity of Lord.[21] The result of this exaltation is that all creation will properly honor the one crucified and thereby shamed. Thus, as the hymn (1870) put it:
At the Name of Jesus, every knee shall bow,
Every tongue confess Him King of glory now;
’Tis the Father’s pleasure we should call Him Lord,
Who from the beginning was the mighty Word.
As another hymn (1916) phrased it:
Lift high the cross, the love of Christ proclaim,
Till all the world adore His sacred Name.
A praise song poetically recounts the course of the ancient hymn.
Lord, I lift Your name on high
Lord, I love to sing Your praises
I'm so glad You're in my life
I'm so glad You came to save us
You came from heaven to earth
To show the way
From the earth to the cross
My debt to pay
From the cross to the grave
From the grave to the sky
Lord, I lift Your name on high
Paul can testify to dramatic alteration that occurs when Christ becomes Lord in one’s life (Philippians 3:4b-14). He grants that his religious life gave him much about which to boast, for he had been an observant and obedient Jew. He had the privileges of his birth, but he also chose to be part of the most observant sect of his time, the Pharisees. He organized his life around Torah, and when a dangerous teaching arose that threatened the Torah and proclaimed Jesus as Messiah arose, he persecuted them. He was zealous to protect the tranditions of the ancestors. The religious man was also a violent man, which seems common in all cultures and in all times. The transformation that occurs in him makes him an apostle of reconciliation and peace. At a specific moment, his conversion, he set aside that which gave him so much pride as if it were economic loss because of Christ. Things once considered valuable are nothing to him, as he rebalances the accounting book of his life. What has become of value is knowing Christ Jesus as his Lord. His perception of what made anything a gain or loss has changed. Thus, for the sake of comparison, he considers anything that one might think of an advantage as rubbish to gain Christ, the most precious thing of all. He contrasts righteousness through faith in Christ (πίστεως Χριστοῦ) from that which comes from the law. By becoming “in Christ,” the believer shares in the righteousness of Christ. Such a statement contains the basis for the doctrine of justification, of which faith is the means of justification rather than its source. This notion of an exchange of places between the innocent Jesus, executed as a sinner, means the manifestation of the righteousness of God in those whom Christ represents before God. Yet, such an exchange of places occurs only as sinners for whom Jesus died let their lives link to the death of Jesus.[22] He wants to know in a personal way Christ and the power of his resurrection, for it will transform his life and give his life power. He considers it a gain in his life that he can share (κοινωνίαν) in the suffering of Christ, becoming like or conformed to him (συμμορφιζόμενος) in his death. His life is conforming or forming to that of Christ through the suffering he presently experiences. His apostolic ministry involved much suffering. He applies the cross of suffering that led to the cross of Jesus to his experience of suffering as an apostle. His theology of the cross entails discipleship as fellowship with Christ in his suffering. His hope is in the direction of resurrection. Moving from a summary of his kerygma, he returns to the effect upon his life. He will shift the imagery from commerce to athletic competition. Such language reminds us as readers that the Christian life is goal oriented and future directed, as we will find in an athletic contest or in a successful competitor. His has, obviously, not yet attained the goal of resurrection, but he presses on to make it his own, for Christ has made Paul part of the risen Christ. He forgets what is behind and repeatedly strains forward to what lies ahead, he continually and in a determined fashion presses toward the goal for the prize, which is Christ. Just as the winner of a contest stands on a pedestal to receive the crown or prize, so will those who are in faith relationship and union with Christ receive the prize of eternal life. Suffering is finite and temporal. No contest is infinite in duration; nor is a human life. The Christian situation is a provisional one.
Paul identifies an error in the community at Philippi that involved the cross (Philippians 3:17-4:1). Their eschatological judgment will come, although his tone is regretful. God has chosen to enter our world of suffering, bear our sin, experience our punishment for our sin, and promise eventual victory over sin and death in the resurrection. This means God has not chosen to wipe away this world, which includes the tears of our suffering. God has chosen to embrace our world suffering, inviting humanity to participate in divine life. If we do so, we can be part of a movement that involves our participation in the provisional representation of the new humanity in Christ. Instead of already wiping away every tear, God has chosen to embrace the tears our suffering cause. God has taken the risk to become part of our lives. We do not need to keep the cross at a distance. In fact, we need to cherish the cross. the cross leads the church to recognize that its citizenship is in heaven, from which we are expecting a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Our home is where God is, and God chooses to come and make a home with us forever. Our true citizenship is in God’s coming rule, and our mission is to extend the life of that rule on earth until the King arrives to take over. The resurrection of Jesus is the prototype of what God will do for us. God will give us new bodies not subject to death and decay but bodies that conform to the glory of the body of the resurrected Christ. The event of reconciliation has the goal of overcoming the breach that sin brought into our fellowship with God and at our own perfecting. This eschatological future has dawned already in Jesus Christ, even if under the concealment of the cross. Yet, it is present as our transforming into the image of Christ, the new human.[23]
Paul will focus our attention upon salvation through Christ as a gift (Ephesians 2:1-10). Those whom God saves have fallen, stepped away, or made a false step (παραπτώμασιν) and missed the mark or target morally and spiritually (ἁμαρτίαις). The deadness of this life is one from which we are never completely free, for believers need to acknowledge their solidarity with the rest of humanity regarding the pull of this deadness. The New Testament witness suggests the world has come under the tyranny of an ungodly force, the prince of this world. Paul admits that Jew and Gentile follow the passions (ἐπιθυμίαις) of our flesh (σαρκὸς). Jew and Gentile deserve condemnation from God as humanity has the same heritage and are united in wrestling with the self-destructive forces of the passions of the flesh. God will hinder the inevitable slide of humanity toward death because God is rich mercy and has a deep and profound love (ἀγάπην) for humanity. God has taken us out of the deadness of our trespasses and made us alive together with Christ. This happened because God acted to by grace (χάριτί) to accomplish salvation (σεσῳσμένοι) for humanity. God has imparted this salvation to believers already through the gospel. Thus, God has raised us up (συνήγειρεν) with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Through baptism, the believer experiences death and resurrection with Christ and translation to heaven with Christ. For by grace (χάριτί) God has saved (σεσῳσμένοι, see verse 5, a perfect tense that emphasizes salvation as already accomplished) you through faith (πίστεως). Grace is not something God gives; grace is who God is. An unexplainable goodness is at work in the universe.[24] Such an affirmation is faith because it remains contrary to much of our experience of the harshness of life. The confession of our faith has a deep connection to acknowledging our need for grace. In addition, this is not your own doing; it is the gift (δῶρον) of God. Such grace is not the result of works, so that no one may boast. Yet, when believers engage in the doing of good works, they are walking toward God. Human beings walking by grace through faith are a work of art. We in our individuality are part of a much larger whole. Life is not about us. We are a moment of eternity, a part in a larger picture, and a player in vast drama. Our lives are about allowing this larger picture to form through us and allowing eternity to shine through us. Viewing our lives this way allows us to see our connection with everything else.
Paul will also express the challenge of human life as the contrasting choices of light and darkness (Ephesians 5:8-14). Human choices are not morally neutral since our choices reflect darkness or light. Darkness creates people who live in it; light creates people who live in it. Our actions reflect our identity. The metaphor of the fruit of the light suggests the importance of time and maturity in producing what good (ἀγαθωσύνῃ) and right (δικαιοσύνῃ) and true (ἀληθείᾳ). The “trinity” of the philosophical themes of the time was that of the good, true, and beautiful, and Paul is consistent with that thinking here. They are to find out, examine, test, or discern (δοκιμάζοντες) what is pleasing to the Lord, which will be consistent with the previously mentioned goodness, righteousness, and truth. Such discernment is a practical skill we need to learn to be a disciple of Jesus. The revelatory power of light is transforming. It awakens us to the actualization of the divine calling or vocation upon us. The resurrection and glorification of Christ leads to new life for the readers in which Christ shines on them. As Christ shines on them, they become light and gain the strength and discernment to live as children of light. The source of the light in which believers live is Christ. Christ shines on them, enabling them to be light and to walk as children of light.
Peter will urge his readers to follow the example of Christ (I Peter 3:18-22), even as Paul does in Philippians 2. Christ suffered at a unique moment in history, but in way that had universal impact because he suffered for the sins of us all. Peter reminds his hearers that while they are to be righteous, they are not to forget that the unrighteous are also those for whom Christ died. This passage suggests that the nature and efficacy of the suffering and death of Jesus are central issues. The righteous one suffered for the deeds of the unrighteous to bring each of us personally to God. Roman and Jewish leaders put him to death in the flesh, but God made him alive in the spirit. In the suffering his readers are enduring now, they become an example and witness to their world, as did Jesus. If the believer is going to suffer like Jesus, then Peter wants them to know that they, too, will share the resurrection spirit with Jesus. Peter will then give an unusual example of the witness of Christ, who preached to evil spirits. Along with I Peter 4:6, this brief passage becomes the basis for the statement in the Apostles' Creed that Christ "descended into hell." Reflecting upon what he just said about death in the flesh and life in the spirit for Jesus, Peter then affirms that in the form of “spirit” he proclaimed his message to the spirits in prison, to the worst of sinners. He alludes to the descent of Christ to Hades between his death and resurrection. In Matthew 12:40, Jesus says the Son of Man is in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights. God frees Jesus from the pangs of Hades, for it was impossible for the power of Hades to hold him (Acts 2:24). God did not abandon Jesus to Hades, where his body did not experience corruption, as one might normally expect (Acts 2:31). Paul refers to going down to the depths and bringing Christ back from the dead (Romans 10:7). Christ had gone down to the deepest levels of the earth (Ephesians 4:9). "Holy ones" came out of their graves, rose from the dead, and appeared to several people (Matthew 27:52-53). He is present for us even in the darkest places, and though we may feel all on our own, we are not ever godforsaken when we trust him. It suggests that the worst that can befall human beings is within the redeeming embrace of the cross. Peter raises the difficult matter concerning those who had died before Christ. He seems to reflect an earlier strand of tradition grounded in the imagery of the prophet Ezekiel's vision of the dry bones coming to life (Ezekiel 37:12-13). Peter goes on to identify those in prison as those indifferent to spiritual matters who died in the flood. Peter is stressing that the gospel itself is not limited to the time of Jesus and forward, but also is efficacious retroactively. Peter is not done with powerful images as he shows that the flood prefigures baptism. As the flood meant the death of the old and the beginning of the new, so does baptism in the life of the believer. Baptism involves the acquisition of new virtues, that will lead to a good conscience, that internal moral compass all persons have, which will lead us to lives that properly witness to what God has done in Christ.
His imagery of the ark led to many reflections in the tradition regarding the church as that ark that saves. This passage highlights the essentials of the story of salvation: Christ suffered and died, Christ rose again bringing the disobedient spirits along with him, Christ sits at the right hand of God. Yet, for Peter this creedal formulation is more than mere theological reflection - it has very practical and pastoral significance. The truth of the Gospel grounds the timid in their faith, reminds the unsure of the efficacy of baptism, and chides those who might be taken in by heresy to stand firm even in the face of suffering.
The Letter to the Hebrews (5:5-10) will refer to God appointing Jesus as high priest, in the words of Psalm 2:7, that he was the Son and has begotten him today, and in the words jof Psalm 110:4, you are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. Although Jesus is not of Levitical descent, he was indeed a high priest, one like ourselves, who bears out infirmities, weaknesses, and petitions before God. In his earthly life, Jesus, as the poet of Psalm 116:1-8 said, but as is also true of his Gethsemane prayer, offered prayers, supplications, with loud voice and tears to God, who could save him from death, and who heard him because of us reverent submission to the will of God. The confessional statement of the author associates Jesus with the suffering servant of II Isaiah. Jesus learned obedience through what he suffered. The point of the learning by Jesus is the affirmation of the sinless quality of the life of Jesus. Jesus lived with the fallen condition of humanity. He lived and bore it as the Son. Yes, he wrestled with the fallen condition of his humanity, learning and struggling, yet, as the Son, God had to win in his life choices. In that sense, Jesus struggled as we all do to do the will of God. The Son is one with us all in that struggled. Yet, he made his life choices perfectly.[25]Christ maintained his perfection in freedom in a way that was not by any means self-evident. In his acts, he was without sin. He was perfectly obedient.[26] One practices authentic obedience in particular situations. Jesus demonstrated obedience as life placed him situations in which doing the will of God and obedience confronted challenges from the people and institutions around him. Jesus was never disobedient to the will of God. He had unfailing constancy in obedience to the will of God. Yet, Jesus encountered new situations that challenged his faithfulness to God.[27] Here the author holds Jesus up as a model for his audience and helps them see their own plight differently. He reached a new level in the experience of obedience, fulfilling the plan of God through his death.
Hebrews 10:16-25 refers to the new and inward covenant. The seal of approval for the priesthood of Christ is his sacrifice, which initiates the new covenant promised in Jeremiah 31:33-34. To show that sanctification was always the will of God, the author chooses a promise to the alter the human heart. This covenant was written on stone and stored in the Ark but inscribed in the mind and deposited in the heart. Further, the Lord will not remember their sins. He argues that because of the alteration of the heart, we have no need of repeated offering for sin. God changes human hearts, certainly, and in that change, God not only forgives sin, but forgets as well. This covenant is a full and final forgiveness and the entire pardon of sins. It destroys every barrier for us and enables us to realize full communion with God. There is no need for further offerings of sacrifice; our sin has been unconditionally canceled. What Christ has done gives us special status before God. Jesus is both the sacrifice and the high priest. No longer do we need a priestly intermediary to represent us before God because Christ is our high priest. Since God has established the new inclusive covenant through Jesus with Jew and Gentile, and since God has forgiven sin once and for all, then human beings have no reason to continue to offer a sin-offering sacrifice. He is both victim and priest. He is both offering and officiant. The author shows how the death of Jesus replaced the sacrificial system of Ancient Israel, and in fact, surpassed it, because unlike animal sacrifice, which did not serve to nullify sin, Jesus’ death does. In fact, the dominant theme in Hebrews is that through Jesus Christ, who has become the perfect high priest, the believer now has complete access to God, knowing how to worship God fully and authentically. The Jewish system of sacrifice and worship is now, according to the author, obsolete. Christ has superseded the worship patterns of the Levitical priests. God, the Almighty, is still transcendent and in many ways remote - but Jesus Christ has bridged the gap between Creator and creature.
The Gospel lesson come from portions of each of all four gospels. I combine the passion accounts of the Synoptic Gospels and have a separate discussion of the Passion Narrative in John.
Consistent with the Lent theme of exposing the human situation for what it is, Jesus points out that our religious life can be an expression of self-centeredness rather than devotion to God. Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18, 19-21 explores elements of true piety before God. Self-centered piety displays a desire to be an actor in the religious life, and thus be a false and artificial devotee. Jesus calls upon his followers to exhibit a higher form of piety than the finest religious people of his day. Actions of piety designed so that others will see them goes down the wrong path. Piety rightly practiced leads one to a satisfying, healing, and freeing relationship with God, regardless of what others may think of as religious. The only status that matters is what God recognizes. Acts of charitable giving, of prayer, and of fasting, for example, have their orientation toward deepening and broadening our relationship with God. Therefore, we best perform such acts away from the observation of others so that our motivation remain in the right place. The Jewish community usually reserved the fast for extreme situations. Individual fasting is an expression of mourning and repentance, an act of humility that intensifies the experience of prayer. It could give one the reputation of being a saint. For Jesus, his disciples are to act in ways that others will not notice they are fasting. The orientation of the fasting person is toward God alone. Verses 19-21, a saying from Q, refer to our attitude toward possessions. Jesus is offering the advice regarding possessions to adopt the perspective of eternity. As participants in the rule of God that the ministry of Jesus is bringing, they do not need to worry about food, clothing, or shelter. Earthly wealth is transient, perishable, and at risk, while the wealth we store in heaven has an enduring quality. That which we treasure reveals orientation of our hearts.
The synoptic Gospels explore the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness.
I begin with Mark 1:9-15. Verses 9-11 is a story about the baptism of Jesus, which I explored in my discussion of texts for Epiphany. The baptism is the beginning of the eschatological age, which the theological significance of the Father tearing open the heavens and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. A voice from heaven, which we will not hear again until the Mount of Transfiguration, identifies Jesus as the Son of the Father, reflecting Psalm 2:7, a royal psalm, and is the Beloved, with whom the Father is well pleased, as in Isaiah 42:7 in referring to the suffering servant. We have here the impartation of the Spirit and the thought of adoption.[28] Jesus is the elect Son of God.[29] As such, Jesus becomes a model of election as serving humanity for the mission God gave him.[30] The baptism of Jesus in these ways has a unique role in identifying who Jesus is as uniquely the Son of the Father. The heavenly voice validates Jesus as the bearer of divine revelation, both in his teaching and in his person. Mark can begin his gospel seriously, having revealed to us the unique nature of Jesus of Nazareth. It reveals the future of Jesus as king and servant, as enthroned and as the suffering servant. Verses 12-13 is the story of the temptation. Part of the context involves Jesus alone in prayer. Jesus frequently withdrew from the crowds and the disciples. We then learn that the Spirit moved upon Jesus in a strong, even violent, compulsion to bring Jesus into the wilderness, where he was forty days tempted by Satan. Temptation refers to allurement or enticement to do evil. Temptation is like a trap into which the unwary can fall (I Timothy 6:9). Any test of moral virtue is a temptation to the one tested. Satan tempts because he wants to destroy. Human beings succumb to temptation because they have strong desires toward sin and evil.[31] Jesus was with the wild beasts in the wilderness. This may refer to the dangers Jesus confronted in the wilderness. It may also be a peaceful reference to the messianic ideal of a restoration of the heavenly peace as in Isaiah 11:6-9, where lion and lamb are at peace and children can play with poisonous snakes. Patristic era commentators took this approach. For them, the presence of the “wild beasts” drew a parallel with Adam while in the garden of Eden. Once more Satan is tempting the “human one” amid the beasts, but this time the “human one” prevails and to the point where angels ministered to him, rather than the angels driving him out, as we find in Genesis 3:22-24. On this reading of the “wild beasts,” the “wilderness” is not a satanic and Godforsaken place. Rather, God is present with Jesus throughout this trial in the same way God was present with Adam in Eden and Israel in Sinai. Yet whereas both humanity generally (Adam) and the chosen people of God (Israel) have failed such temptations in the past, this time the “human one” succeeds in plundering Satan’s house (Mark 3:27). Further, Jesus received divine protection in the presence of the angels with him. This story could suggest that there are terrors, and there are gracious powers to help us face them. All of this could mean than that this passage signals that the eschatological warfare is beginning, centering upon Jesus. This passage is intense and shows the trials of the experience which Jesus endured. Many at this time believed wild beasts to be demon possessed. Yet, God’s protection was there during the trial. Thus, Jesus fully identifies with the people of God, who have their own wilderness to go through in life. It could be a preview of the struggle to come. The scene could portray both the danger of the wilderness and the protection of Jesus as Son of God. Verses 14-15 provide a summary of the preaching of Jesus. Jesus calls for a response to the coming rule of God. Mark describes the message of Jesus as proclaiming (κηρύσσων)the gospel or good news (εὐαγγέλιον) of God, which may explain why the early church used the term “gospel” for the comprehensive presentations of the Jesus tradition.[32] “The time (καιρὸς) is fulfilled (Πεπλήρωται). God is the one fulfilling time in this way. Mark is not referring to chronos (extended time), but kairos (the right time for something to happen). Scripture, Law, and the purpose of the old covenant find their fulfillment in Christ. The promises and prophecies of the Old Testament find their fulfillment in the arrival of Jesus. If the time finds its fulfillment, the fulfillment comes in a moment, an event, in the arrival of Jesus. This real event occurs as a particular event and a particular time, a center around which all other times will revolve. The time before has moved toward Christ. The time after Jesus moves away from this event. Humanity has time because Jesus had his time. We have the fullness of our time because we orient ourselves to and live our lives from the perspective of the time Jesus has. The purpose of our time after this decisive event is to allow space before the rule of God to repent and believe. Those who do believe have as their primary purpose to make known this event. They too must wait expectantly, even as the universe waits, for this last event.[33] The second piece of the proclamation of Jesus: and the kingdom or rule of God has come near (ἤγγικεν). Jesus spoke of the rule of God as close or already present but hidden, and thus in a way that frustrates ordinary expectations. The third piece of Jesus' proclamation is the same message John preached - the call for people to repent (μετανοεῖτε). To repent does not mean merely to turn away from a specific sin but turning toward God in faith and obedience. Such repentance means complete re-orientation, both inward and outward, of the whole person to the God who truly has turned to humanity in time.[34] Such repentance implies genuine knowledge of oneself that includes our participation in sin.[35] The final piece of the summary of the proclamation of Jesus is the call to believe (πιστεύετε) in the good news (εὐαγγελίῳ). In Mark, belief is trusting in the coming rule of God. The proclaiming of the presence of the rule of God and its salvation in those who in faith rely on its all-determinative future is now a motive for conversion to God on the part of the hearers.[36] Faith means the unquestioning trust in this God that is the positive side of this re-orientation; the new life that is the only possible life after this event in the time that follows it.[37]
I will consider the story of the temptation of Jesus in Matthew (4:1-11) and Luke (4:1-13) together, since they are so similar. The story foreshadows the life and destiny of Jesus. It has its basis in theological and Christological reflection. The test of Jesus alone in the wilderness mirrors the temptation of the human representative, Adam/Eve. It also mirrors the wandering of Israel in the wilderness as they also succumbed to the temptation to turn from the covenant established through Moses. In contrast to both Old Testament stories, Jesus conforms who he is as the Son and the path of obedience to the Father that will characterize his life. The Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to experience testing (πειρασθῆναι) by the devil (διαβόλου). while Israel proved to be a disobedient son in the wilderness, Jesus will prove to be a loyal and obedient Son. He represents the people of God in a way that Israel failed to do. His long fast had the design of bringing him close to the Father. The Spirit led him to the wilderness for that reason. After the 40 days Jesus is hungry, so the tempter (πειράζων) begins a series of three temptations. He begins with the Christological affirmation that refers to him as the Son of God. Since Jesus is hungry, and if he is the Son of God, he should command the stones to become bread. Thus, as Moses provided the Israelites manna in the wilderness, Jesus could provide himself bread in his hunger. He refuses by referring to Deuteronomy 8:3, part of the wilderness wanderings, that one does not live by physical bread by the word of God. Jesus showed the path to passing the test. The temptation Adam and Eve faced was to “take and eat” of the fruit of a divinely forbidden tree, thereby becoming like God. They were not even hungry. Jesus will resist the one tempting him where Adam and Eve failed. A second temptation involves the devil taking Jesus to a high mountain and showing him the kingdoms of the world in their glory and claiming to give it all to Jesus if he will fall at his feet and worship him. He wants only what God deserves. The promise is that the God will give the kingdoms to the Messiah (Psalm 2:8) and to the Son of Man (Daniel 7:14). The devil claims such pre-eminence in this world. Here is a seductive gift, but only if he will give up his identity and acknowledge the pre-eminence of the devil. Political power is always tempting. The response of Jesus is to send Satan (Σατανᾶ) away, referring to Deuteronomy 6:13 that one ought to worship and serve the Lord only. A third temptation led Jesus to the holy city and placed him on a part of the Temple columns that flared out and begins with the Christological affirmation of Jesus being the Son of God. This time, the devil urges him to throw himself down, using Psalm 91:11-12 to remind Jesus of the promise that the angels will bear him up and protect him. A twisting of scription can become a vehicle for a test of who we are. Such an act would have denied the Incarnation and his full participation in human life. The response of Jesus is to refer to another part of the wilderness wandering in Deuteronomy 6:16 that one ought not to put the Lord to the test. The point of this story is to show that Jesus passes the test by being obedient to the Father. The great significance of this temptation narrative is not that Jesus withstood these trials, but that in them Jesus' true nature and identity as the "Son of God" are celebrated. His fidelity to God and unshakable commitment to carrying out God's plans are what reveal Jesus' genuine "Son of God" identity to the believing reader. As the Devil tries to sabotage the unique quality of this relationship between God and his son Jesus, he begins with a small, even innocuous test of Jesus' power.
Mark 8:31-38 contains the first prophecy of the passion in Mark and a group of sayings around theme of loyalty in following Jesus. It will connect the suffering of Jesus with the challenge in being a follower of Jesus. Christology and discipleship are inseparable. Verses 31-33 become a summary of his understanding of the gospel message, reflecting the belief of Jesus that the Son of Man, the Messiah, must suffer like the suffering servant in II Isaiah. Considering the hostility of Jewish leaders, the suffering reflected in II Isaiah and by the prophet Jeremiah and even by Elijah, as well as the arrest and death of John the Baptist, it would be surprising if Jesus did not consider this potential for his own fate. Mark composed a gospel climaxing with the cross and the promise of resurrection. The early tradition behind the passion story seems simply to have recognized the divine necessity of the innocent suffering and death of Jesus in fulfillment of the prophetic testimonies of scripture. This early tradition contrasts with later theological interpretations that give the death of Jesus an expiatory significance.[38] Peter will rebuke Jesus, challenging the authority of Jesus as he expresses a harsh truth, but Jesus rebukes Peter, reasserting his authority, and inviting Peter to accept his role as a disciple. Jesus refers to Peter as Satan at this point, suggesting the wilderness temptation after his baptism has returned through Peter. Yet, Peter represents all of us in the confusing path that following Jesus often leads. Verses 34-38 focus our attention upon loyalty and fidelity by followers of Jesus when faced with circumstances that call for courage and sacrifice. First, followers must give up their world, as defined by their membership in a kinship group, the people they were yesterday, the relationships that gave them security, and take up the cross, which represents horrible suffering and affliction as a consequence of the special calling and sending we receive by identifying with Jesus, and make the center of your family of choice Jesus and those gathered around him. Paul said he died self every day (I Corinthians 15:30). To follow him means co-crucifixion, a theme we find in Paul as he refers to his own crucifixion so that his life is a matter of Christ living in and through him (Galatians 2:19-20). Such a saying is hard because we avoid suffering as much as we can. However, a full and meaningful life involves suffering, for if you love, you will suffer, and love is the one experience that help us through our suffering. Second, in a paradoxical secular proverb also in Luke 17:33, those who save their lives (psyche, life, soul, self) will lose it, while those who live their lives for the sake of following Jesus and for the sake of the gospel will save them. As the Prayer of Saint Francis puts it, “For it is in dying to self, that we are born to eternal life.” When we choose the self, we lose what we seek.[39] We renounce the self in favor of Jesus.[40] If we concern ourselves with the self in our practice of discipleship, we will miss the very thing discipleship offers. You will achieve the desire of your heart as a follower of Jesus if you lose your focus upon the self.[41] The first person to live out this pattern was Jesus. Jesus saved his life at the cost of proclaiming his message of the rule of God. Had he saved his life, he would have made himself independent of God. He would not have been the Son by an unending finite existence. Jesus chose an earthly existence consumed in divine service. He did not cling to his life. He showed obedience to the mission, regardless of the consequences.[42] Third, in another piece of secular wisdom in the form of a rhetorical question, what would it profit anyone to gain the entire world and forfeit one’s life? What will you give in return for your life? It would be a bad exchange. The point of the question is to deepen our understanding and appreciation for the value of the self. Excessive focusing on our identity is a deformation of the theme of a human life. The goods and tasks of our lives and our openness to God need to be primary and therefore the source of our identity. We can see a parallel in Plato as he suggested that the upright and good are happy, while the pursuit of happiness for its own sake is egocentric and leads us astray. Only those who seek the good for its own sake will find happiness and identity (Gorgias 491bff, especially 506c.7ff and 470e.9f).[43] Fourth, in a sentence of holy law, if we have shame before our contemporaries, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when he enters the glory of the Father and the angels. Such a saying stands at the beginning of Christian confession. It refers to publicly taking sides in a conflict, in this case, the conflict relating to the message and person of Jesus.[44] Jesus becomes the head of the elect community. Holy law promised definite eschatological ramifications to the fulfillment of human actions.
I now turn our attention to the Gospel of Luke.
Luke 13:1-9 contain pronouncement stories on repentance, both unique to Luke. In verses 1-5, Jesus uses an atrocity committed by Pilate as an example for us as sinners that unless we repent (μετανοῆτε) we will also perish. The event foreshadows end-time judgment, as does another event involving a natural disaster. Both events disclose the precarious quality of life. It also contains a parable concerning the unproductive, barren fig tree, which connects to the call to repentance. The owner looked for fruit and found none, which in Jeremiah 8:13 was a sign of judgment from the Lord. In Isaiah 5, the Lord tended the vineyard, but it bore no fruit, a sign of the disobedience of Israel. The owner was patient in waiting three years for fruit, but that patience is over, so he tells the gardener to cut it down, since it is taking up the nutrients of the ground from other trees are producing fruit. However, the gardener urges the owner to allow another year, stressing the immanent nature of the judgment, as the gardener the fig tree both grace and time and a richer environment. It implies hope. Human beings have a brief period until judgment arrives. We do not know if the owner accepts the advice of the gardener. The patience of owner and gardener will not last forever. The parable takes on the nuance of the human life marked by unproductivity. Those who need to repent (bear fruit) have a time-frame within which to do so, another sobering indication about the shortness of the time at hand.
Luke 13:31-35, has a pronouncement story against Herod which is unique to Luke. Some Pharisees warn him to leave Galilee because Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch of Galilee, whose official residence, and regional capital city, Sepphoris, was four miles north of Nazareth, wants to kill him. Jesus assumes these Pharisees are in the employ of Herod and tells them to tell that fox that he is casting out demons and performing cures today, tomorrow, and on the third day he finishes his work. Yet, he must be on his way, anticipating the three days between his death and resurrection. The reason is that to fulfill his divine mission as a prophet he will be killed in Jerusalem. He has a message for that city, and he will die there. Thus, a prophet is not welcome in his home country (Luke 4:24, Mark 6:4, Matthew 13:57, John 4:44), but Jesus also makes it clear that he will share the fate of other prophets before him. This text also a Q saying concerning the lament of Jesus over Jerusalem. Israel had the possibility of a Yes to what God was now doing in Jesus, but reverted to its behavior in the wilderness and its behavior toward the prophets, especially Elijah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. Jesus implies many visits to Jerusalem as he desired to gather the children of the city as a hen gathers her brood under wings, an image drawn from Isaiah 31:5, where God is a bird hovering protectively over the city. The image of the sheltering wings of God under which the people find refuge is one we find in Deuteronomy 32:11, Ruth 2:12, Psalm 17:8, 57:1, 61:4, and 91:4. Here is the only time Jesus uses a female image for himself. However, the reality is harsh in that the city was not willing. This saying views the death of Jesus as a prophetic destiny known in advance from the Old Testament.[45] God has left their house (desolate in some manuscripts of Matthew 23:38, consistent with the LXX version of Jeremiah 22:5). I Kings 9:7, Jeremiah 12:7 and Tobit 14:4 focus on the coming destruction of the temple of Solomon. This brief statement reflects a prophecy concerning the besieging and destruction of Jerusalem as a judgment of God the people of God. Early Christianity saw a fulfillment of this prophecy in the siege and overthrow of the city by Titus in 70 AD.[46]They will not see Jesus until the time comes when they say, in the words of Psalm 118:26, blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord (Luke 19:38, John 12:13). The saying presents Jesus as a heaven-sent messenger and herald of the wisdom of God commenting on the sad condition of Jerusalem. As such, this saying links the idea of preexistence, which we find in Jewish wisdom speculation in Proverbs 8:22-23 and Sirach 24:3ff, to the figure of Jesus in the tradition concerning him.[47]
Luke 15:1-3, 11-32 contains a brief introduction by Luke and the parable of the prodigal son. Pharisees grumble against his posture of welcoming sinners by eating with them. This chapter will deal with how and why Jesus included such persons in his table fellowship. To enact such hospitality is to initiate a kind of generosity that his critics considered as time wasted on the unrighteous or, even worse, crosses the line into unacceptable religious behavior with sinners. The parable itself focuses on the joy God has in recovering what was lost. Jesus is the herald of a loving Father who shows mercy to the repentant sinner. The heart of the message of Jesus was announcing the nearness of the divine reign, but Jesus called this God the heavenly Father. In Jesus, God shows himself to be the Father who is ready to forgive those who turn to him.[48] Jesus regarded the loving and saving address of God to us, and particularly to the needy and the lost among us, as the purpose of his sending. He believed that by his sending, the Father was addressing the lost. In this parable, Jesus is defending addressing his message and work to the lost.
I now turn to the texts from the Gospel of John.
John 2:13-22 (Mark 11:15-17) is his version of the cleansing of the temple, placed at the begin of the ministry of Jesus. The story shows the abrogation of the Jewish temple system. Jesus and his community will replace it. Through Jesus, the perfect, eschatological worship becomes possible. The injustice was that the religious establishment transformed the temple into a corrupt machine for cheating pilgrims out of their life savings. His disciples would remember Psalm 68:10, where zeal for the house of the Lord would consume him. The disciples grasp the dangerous consequences of the action of Jesus. His zeal for the house of God will cost him his life. This is the meaning of the quotation because the psalm too speaks of something more than an inwardly consuming zeal. The psalmist suffers insolently and provokes many to hate him. The early church understood the psalm as Messianic. John describes the disciples as remembering this psalm in the actual situation, but John intends the reader to think also of the mortal hatred of the religious establishment that Jesus will soon arouse. Even more importantly, John uses Jesus' first words in this highly charged scenario to give us a glimpse into his unique divine relationship. John reveals the temple to be "my Father's house." From its opening prologue, John's gospel focuses on the unique relationship that exists between the Logos and God, Jesus and his Father. The power and intimacy of this relationship prompts John to change subtly the focus of the outrage of Jesus from the abuse of the temple building in verses 14-15 to the desecration of "his Father's house" in verses 16-17. As the house, the temple is not just a gathering place for people, or even the formal dwelling place of God. The relationship of Jesus to the house is unique because it is "his Father's house." He has special authority within it. He was questioning the validity of the entire sacrificial system itself. He questioned the ability of Israel to atone for its sins, receive forgiveness and stand in right relationship with God. The overseers of the temple, who had charge of good order in the temple and controlled the Levitical police, asked him what sign (σημεῖον, as Paul reminds us in I Corinthians 1:18-25, Jews demand signs) gave him the authority to do this. They call Jesus to account. While they want a sign, Jesus will give them a word. His response is that the prophetic word destroys this temple (ναὸν) and in three days I will raise it up. The historical reality behind the statement is the intimation of the destruction of the temple being the immediate reason for his arrest by Jewish authorities. [49] Jesus apparently agrees to the demand of his interlocutors, but holds out a quite different type of sign. He answers with an enigmatic saying, which cannot but remain obscure to them. Formally, it resembles the procedure of the Old Testament prophets, who often used a cryptic mashal to give a sign. However, it is also in keeping with the procedure of the Johannine Christ, who often utters words of revelation that lead his hearers to misunderstand him. As often happens in John, they misunderstand what Jesus said. Thus, the authorities respond that the temple has been under construction for 46 years, and he will raise it up in three days? John gives an aside to the reader that Jesus was speaking of the temple (ναοῦ) of his body. Jesus freely surrenders his body to destruction. However, within three days he will deliver it again from death. Thus, after the Father raised him from the dead, the disciples remembered what he had said, believed the scripture, and believed the word he had spoken. The cleansing of the temple becomes a revelation of his glory that God discloses to those who believe.
John 3:1-17 continues a reflection upon the relation of Jesus to the Law. The discourse discloses and brings home the significance of the Christian revelation. We best understand it as a proclamation composed by the evangelist that makes use of a lofty style such as is usual in a revelation discourse. It contains the whole Johannine preaching in succinct form. It begins with the typical misunderstanding of the one engaging Jesus. In doing so, it shows human weakness in approaching matters of the Spirit. It shows the unique relationship between the Father and Jesus as Son. It shows the important work of the Spirit in bringing people to see what God has done in Jesus. Therefore, the passage is an important source of reflection upon the doctrine of the Trinity. It may well be that the doctrine of the Trinity reveals that relationships stand at the heart of the universe. Atoms do not exist unless they are in relationship with other atoms. You and I do not exist unless in relationships with others. Even God exists in relationship. The human soul is not within. The human soul is not without. The human soul is between. This means that we exist personally, communally, and socially in relationship with others. Our identity is as the body of Christ in relationships with this world. If the essence of God is oneness in community, it may well mean that the destiny toward which Christians pray and work is oneness in community with each other and with creation. It stresses the importance of a transition or transformation in the lives of human beings. We need to move from darkness to light and from death to life. It stresses the importance of an event of revelation in Jesus. Thus, no one can see the rule of God, which is the essence of salvation, Jesus offering a symbol of a new time, the age of the rule of God, and new place as the domain of God. [50] One will not see this rule without being born from above or anew (ἄνωθεν), opening a discussion of the possibility of a new life. Judaism was acquainted with the notion of the coming of the Spirit bring new hearts and spirits (Ezekiel 26:25-26) and making sons and daughters (Joel 2:28-29). The Lord will give them a holy spirit through which the Lord will be their father and they will become children of the living God (Jubilee 1:23-25). A time is coming when the children of heaven will receive knowledge of the Most High and wisdom to do what is right (Community Rule of Qumran 1S iv 19-21). The emergence of Nicodemus from darkness will mean he needs to see the truth already in the scripture and which Jesus discloses by his teaching. Thus, Jesus says that no one can enter the rule of God without being born of water and Spirit. In the background is the biblical witness that the Lord will sprinkle the people with clean water, cleanse them, and give them a new spirit (Ezekiel 36:25-26) and the Lord will pour water on the dry land pour the Spirit of the Lord upon the people (Isaiah 44:3). John is referring to baptism and to the gift of the Spirit. In Chapter 1, John has already suggested that the Incarnation overcomes the alienation from the logos that permeates creation, but here, we do not receive the Logos unless we are born anew/from above the Spirit. [51] It suggests the unity of baptism with regeneration by the Spirit. [52] The reason for the new birth is that humanity is naturally weak and mortal and needs birth through the Spirit to perceive things related to the human spirit. Humanity cannot see or enter the rule of God on its own, but only through the agency of the presence of the Spirit. The wind (πνεῦμα) is invisible force we hear and see, which is an analogy for the one born of the Spirit (Πνεύματος). If God is Spirit, the sound fills creation, and the power gives life to all creatures.[53] The association of the Spirit with rebirth is a power to set aside the old and bring to life what is new. The past, as important as it is in shaping us into who we are today, does not determine our future. The agency of the Spirit is the possibility of something new to emerge that will be life-giving and life-sustaining. The Son of Man has descended from heaven. Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, referring to Numbers 21:4-9, and the Son of Man must also be lifted up in the cross, resurrection, and ascension to bring liberation and healing to suffering humanity. The image is not beautiful. Like a snake on a pole, like a criminal on a cross, Jesus offered his life as a sacrifice in a way that makes life for others possible. The point is that whoever believes (πιστεύων) in Jesus as the Son of Man, the Christ, will have eternal life (ζωὴν αἰώνιον). If human beings are to have eternal life, the basis can only be that God wills to live in fellowship with humanity.[54] This work of salvation is the plan of God, the goal of which is the giving of new and eschatological life, which now defines like in the full sense of the term, making earthly life such only with reservations. [55] John gets personal with us as he offers his witness to us. God in a moment and in an act loved (ἠγάπησεν) the world (κόσμον) in a way that elects, helps, guides, and saves. [56] God moves toward the world God has made through the Word in this event. The will of God is toward fellowship with the world God has made. Such love defines the doctrine of election. God has singled out Jesus as the object of divine election that demonstrates divine love for the world. Since the Father is so much with the Son, the Father is also with humanity. God wills to be with the world. Yet, the world responds with opposition, even while God responds with affirmation and salvation. We clearly see the divine Yes toward humanity.[57] It speaks to a unique event that occurs within human history. The object of this love is the world. The world has rejected the light offered in the Son, but this did not alter the love of God for the world. We see the extraordinary nature of this love in the giving of the Son.[58] If we think in terms of the divine essence and existence, the Son reveals the existence of the Father, and by the sending of the Son, the Father reveals the divine essence, that is, divine love.[59] The purpose of this giving is so that one who believes may not perish but receive eternal life. Those who believe become witnesses in this world of this event of divine love. [60] The Christian message consists in the telling of this act of God. In distilling the gospel into a simple statement of the power of divine love, John has served well all of us as readers. The plan of the cross has its root in the immeasurable love of God for the world. The Son is the most cherished gift God had to give. John makes known the greatness of the act of God in the Incarnation and in the mission of bridging the chasm between God and world. God has revealed this love in the historical mission of the Son, to the extent of the cross. The purpose of this giving of the Son is life for others. God bridges the gap caused by human alienation and sin, bringing reconciliation. The sending of the Son into the world, that we might live through him, declares the love of God for us.[61] John makes things clearer by saying that God sent the Son, a notion that presupposes his pre-existence, [62] in such a way that his earthly path as the Son was from the beginning a journey to his passion and death. The saving work of the Son is the purpose of the Father in the sending of the Son. [63] The goal of the sending of the Son is others. [64] The world (κόσμος) is on its way to perishing, but the Father does not condemn the world for that but reaches out to save and redeem it through the giving of the Son.
John 4:5-42 involves a discourse by Jesus around the occasion of his meeting with the Samaritan woman at the well of Jacob. We learn of living water and therefore of life in the Spirit that quenches the thirsty soul. The Samaritan woman comes to represent us all when we come to Jesus. She came to the well in great need. She will meet the one who can satisfy the deepest needs of humanity. The context makes the story even more powerful. The faith of the half-pagan Samaritans who accept Jesus so whole-heartedly stands out in sharp contrast to the superficial crowds in Jerusalem who accepted Jesus only because of signs in Chapter 2. They also stand in contrast to the bewildered Jewish leader Nicodemus in Chapter 3. The story is a drama of a person rising from the things of this world to belief in Jesus. Jesus is patient with her as he was with Nicodemus. He becomes an example to all teachers in this. He is also an example to the church in how it witnesses to its neighbors. The imagery of living water is significant here. Rabbis referred to the Torah as living water. Becoming a disciple of Jesus means moving beyond Torah. It refers to the revelation or wisdom Jesus provides and to the Spirit who brings the revelation to the believer. It suggests the close relation between the giver of that water and the gift of that water. Jesus offers “eternal life” in such a way that human life without it is life only with reservations. [65] We learn of the patience of Jesus in dealing with one who was weak regarding how she handled her sexuality. We learn of the key role of the Jewish people. Salvation (σωτηρία) comes from the Jews. This role has been difficult for the world to accept and a difficult role for the church to understand accept within the context of the revelation of the God of Israel as the Father who sent the Son, Jesus of Nazareth. To reject the Jewish people is to reject God. If the church cooperates with the hostility we find in the world against the Jewish people, it only proves it has become blind and deaf to the Word. Thus, God still has special places of revelation, [66] but we understand them in a distinct perspective. God is spirit, one of the few times the Bible attempts to define God. Thus, God is the origin and sustainer of life. The statement suggests intimacy with the Father. If humanity is to adore God in Spirit and truth, the Spirit of God must fill and penetrate it. This immediate, eschatological gift of the Spirit has come about through Jesus Christ. God is spirit, which is a reminder that God is different from all that is earthly and human. The field theories of modern physics, related to the Stoic view of pneuma no longer view field phenomena as bodily entities, but see them as independent of matter and defined only by their relations to space-time. The possibility that field theory can help the theologian to interpret the notion of God as Spirit depends on relating space-time to the eternity of God. The definition of God as Spirit is the essence of God as well as the third person of the Trinity.[67] As Spirit constitutes the divine essence, the Spirit opposes the world, but is also at work in creation as the origin of life, and the one who sanctifies creatures by giving them a fellowship with the eternal God that transcends their transitory life.[68] In recognizing that one sows and another reaps as a positive image of witnessing, one sees the patience of God through the Spirit in bringing people to faith in Jesus. This passage reminds us that handing over to others what we believe (ἐπίστευσαν) the testimony (λόγον … μαρτυρούσης) reaches its goal when the other person has their personal relation to Christ that we see as the work of the Spirit and the personal act of faith in Jesus. The witness points persons to the “something more” they need in their lives and with which they need to have personal encounter to experience this salvation.
John 11:1-45 is the story of Jesus giving life to his friend Lazarus. This sign confirms Jesus as resurrection and life. The reader has known from the beginning that “life” came into being through him (1:4), but now John makes the point clear in both word (“I am the resurrection and the life”) and deed (“The dead man came out”). The dialogue between Jesus and Martha concerning resurrection involves the typical misunderstanding of the meaning of Jesus by those who hear him. It leads to the word of revelation that Jesus is the resurrection and the life, and those who believe in him will live. Christ is the beyond in whom humanity in its transience, to which departure belongs, sees its temporal being clothed with eternal life.[69] Those who live and die in fellowship with the Redeemer experience no interruption of the relationship, even though they may experience some essential purifying and perfecting.[70] This approach fixes Christian hope on the right basis, even if we need to view this hope within the larger context of the future resurrection of the dead.[71] Martha responds in a way that suggests she is a disciple, for she believes he is the Messiah, the Son of God. On his way to the tomb, Mary interrupts with her grief and weeping, and Jesus weeps with her. He weeps over the power of death cutting short a human life and devastates those left behind to mourn and lament. [72] The crowd sees the depth of the love Jesus had for Lazarus. At the tomb, he prays to the Father that the crowd may believe the Father has sent him. Jesus echoes Isaiah 49:8-9, where the Lord says to prisoners, “Come out.” He also echoes his earlier statement that all who are in their graves will hear the voice of the Lord and come out (5:28-29). The prayer of Jesus shows that the power comes from the Father to the Son. We now see the divine purpose. He did not just heal the body. He brought a new awareness of eternal life, especially for the family. As the Son gives the supreme demonstration of his power over life, the unbelievers resolve to destroy him and take the steps necessary to that end. The path to the cross is marked out in advance, but it is marked in the plan of God. The raising up on the cross will become the glorification of God in the Son. The sign of the raising of the dead is already pointing towards this final glorification.
John 12:1-8 relates the anointing at Bethany. The occasion is not casual, for the people and the religious leaders are looking for him, the latter to arrest him (11:56-57). Since many of his fellow Jewish people believed in him (11:45), the religious leaders want him put to death (11:47-53). Since Bethany is near Jerusalem, he is near his death. Gathering in the home of Lazarus so that the family can thank Jesus for what happened in Chapter 11 makes sense. Martha serves those at the table, but Mary took a pound of uncommon and expensive perfume imported from the Himalayas and anointed the feet of Jesus with it, wiping them with her hair. Underlying the extravagance of the act is the note that the fragrance filled the house. Mary is an example of spiritual devotion. Her extravagant act deserves our pause to ponder that which claims our devotion. Although she receives criticism, Jesus urges others to leave her alone, for she bought it for his burial. What she has done has value now. her symbolic act is honorable and points to his impending death and burial; one cannot demean it. Jesus makes it clear that his life and especially his death on the cross are unique events that the world never experience again. This transitional passage is not about the relationship between Jesus, his disciples, and the poor, but about the meaning of Jesus’ approaching death and burial.
John 12:20-33 tells the story of the preparation for the Passover, with the specific theme of the coming hour. This passage is the climax of Chapters 11-12, as John reflects upon the nearness of the hour of glorification. From the opening, the reader is aware that something different and significant is happening. Rather than Jesus offering a sign to the world (2:11, 4:54), the appearance of the non-Jews who seek him is a sign to Jesus that "his hour" of glorification is drawing near (12:23). To confirm the Pharisees' fears, voiced in v. 19, that the world has gone after him, John immediately introduces as representatives of that entire world some Greeks seeking Jesus. Their arrival indicates that the death of Jesus is imminent. They represent the possibility that human beings are on serious search in their lives. The gospel now takes root in the Hellenistic world. His coming, crucifixion and resurrection will open the door fully to non-Jews to believe in the Lord God of Israel, and John is dramatically foreshadowing this shift here. Jesus has already said that he will welcome other sheep into the fold as part of his universalism. The appearance of Gentiles suggests now is the time to lay down his life. Thus, the appearance of some Greeks seeking him doubtless prefigures the spread of the good news about him beyond Judaism. References to the hour of Jesus in the first eleven chapters of John point forward. Abruptly, in 12:23, the situation changes, and Jesus announces that the hour has now come. What prompts Jesus to make this pronouncement about his crucifixion? Although the Greeks themselves disappear, they usher in a new age. The hour arrives because opposition to Jesus reaches its inevitable outcome: the officials will seek his death. Nevertheless, the hour also arrives because of Jesus' very success with the world. At this "hour" of his "glorification," however, John reveals Jesus (again) as enduring suffering and death if one is to understand his mission. This hour refers to a return to the Father through crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. This glorification because of death is the fullness of saving power that is universal in scope. Jesus draws attention to the meaning of the hour, given to all people, death bearing fruit to all. The death of Jesus is necessary to bring abundant missionary fruit. Death, as the carefully chosen image of the grain of wheat illustrates, brings forth life, not only for Jesus, but also for all those who follow and serve him. The attitude of Jesus toward his impending death becomes a model for all believers. Eternal life is the life promised now to all who become disciples of this glorified one. Jesus refers to his death, and now he refers to the death disciples of Jesus must experience. The call to discipleship is a call to suffer, sacrifice, even die for others to live as God lives, to live as Jesus did. John will give his version of the scene at Gethsemane (Mark 14:32-42, Hebrews 5:7), suggesting the agony of Jesus as he submits to the will of the Father. Jesus accepts the terms of his messianic identity and readily accepting the "coming" of his hour. His obedience mirrors the call to discipleship Jesus extended to others. He prays that the Father glorify the name of the Father in his death. A voice from heaven declares that the Father has glorified the name of the Father during the life of Jesus and will glorify it again in the resurrection and ascension. Eschatological judgment becomes present in unbelief. When Jesus is lifted upon the cross and later ascends to the Father, he will draw all people to himself. This gospel will refer to the horrible act of crucifixion as the glorification of Jesus only through the resurrection and the return of the Son to the Father.
John 13:1-15 is part of the story of Jesus washing the feet of his disciples. The visualization of Jesus stooping down at the feet of these disciples, one of whom would betray him, all of whom would desert him, with a towel and basin to wash their feet, is a powerful image. The point is the humility and service Jesus exhibited to those who ought to have served him. The symbolism of the sacrificial death of Jesus coinciding with the Passover is one the reader ought not to miss. Jesus knew humanity well enough that (in contrast to 7:30 and 8:20 where his hour had not come) Jesus was fully aware that the way events around him were unfolding would lead to his sacrificial death. Yet, this knowledge did not dissuade him from his mission that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father, even as he had come from the Father. Having loved his own, a group larger than the disciples, who were in the world, he loved them to the end. The Greek word here is normally a temporal reference, referring to the end of an action. However, it could also refer to the goal or purpose of an action. In that case, the translation in the New English Bible as “the full extent of his love” becomes possible. For the first time, the life and death of Jesus are the expression of love. That love is total. Judas is a far more threatening figure than is Pilate or the Jewish leaders. As believers, we watch Judas go into the night. What should terrify us is that one of his chosen followers preferred darkness to light. He was physically close to Jesus. He basked in the light, and yet, he preferred darkness. The whole passage is about incarnating into a world of pain and brokenness on behalf of those in need. Into a world of darkness and death, followers of Jesus are to offer light and life. Jesus was commissioning the disciples to do this based on the command to imitate him (v. 15). He invited them to serve, but in ways that were unexpected by the person served.
The first three gospels have an account of the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem (Mark 11:1-11, Matthew 21:1-11, and Luke 12:28-40). It is a manifestation of Jesus as the Christ, or a Christophany. The point understood by Matthew is that the messianic King's humility extends beyond the simple beast of burden scorned by the Roman overlords of Judea, reaching even to the innocent, immature offspring of such an unassuming beast. True kingship, the King of Kings quietly proclaims, is humility.[73] The large crowd gathering, spreading out their cloaks, and cutting off branches, symbolizes the portrayal of Jesus as the Savior of the common and ordinary people. The actions next taken by the disciples and the people are symbolic of the authority of Jesus. There are elements here that are equally at home among the traditional victory processions of Greco‑Roman warrior‑kings. The large citizen escort, accompanying hymns or chants, symbolic acquiescence in the new ruler's authority, and a concluding temple ritual: All were part of pagan‑political events familiar to the Greco‑Roman world. The crowds shout for salvation and deliverance, with Matthew specifying their desire for the Son of David to save them, but Mark has a reference to the rule of their ancestor David. The epithet is applied also to Jerimoth, II Chronicles 11:18, Solomon II Chronicles 1:1, 13:6, 35:3; Proverbs 1:1, the Teacher of Ecclesiastes (1:1), as well as the Joseph (Matthew 1:20) and Nathan (Luke 3:31). Then, in the words of Psalm 118:25-26, Matthew and Mark emphasize that Jesus is a worthy fulfillment of the expectations regarding the descendants of David. Many Christians will find it difficult to recall some traditional hymns for this moment. A hymn by Jeanette Threlfall, (1821-1880) opens with “Hosanna, loud hosanna,” referring to little children singing through the court and temple. The anthem is lovely, as they sing to Jesus, who blessed them. It refers to arriving from Olivet, with the victor palm branch waving as the Lord of earth and heaven rode in a humble state. The third verse of “Hosanna loud hosanna” refers to singing the final phrase as that ancient song we sing, for Christ is our redeemer, Lord of heaven and our king. It concludes with urging us to praise Christ with heart, life, and voice, for in his blissful presence we can eternally rejoice. Further, an ancient hymn from the 600s by Theodulph of Orleans and translated by John Mason Neale in the 1800s refers to the lips of children singing sweet hosannas to the King of Israel and the royal Son of David, who comes in the name of the Lord, the King and Blessed One. Luke adds to the praise offered on this day that the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works which they had seen. Testifying to the great acts of God is something that Israel traditionally did as part of their covenant renewal ceremonies. Christians have a strange reference point for the great deeds of the Lord. The world is full of dangerous monsters that we would like someone to slay. The Romans were powerful oppressors. At least Israel could point to deliverance from Egypt. Yet, Christians go back to the way God was present Jesus. in the last week of his life, he handed himself over to religious and political authorities. He did not seek the power, wealth, and prestige of position in this world. He chose the peculiar path to which his Father called him. The destiny of his life was not a throne, but a cross. This path the church proclaims as the great deeds of the Lord. Luke concludes with: 39 Some of the Pharisees from the multitude said to him, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!” 40 He answered them, “I tell you that if these were silent, the stones would cry out.” Jesus’ concluding statement to the Pharisees echoes Habakkuk 2:11. Luke ends his account with a clear indication that Jesus intended the crowd to understand this royal symbolism.
The passion narrative in the synoptic gospels (Mark 14:1-15:47, Matthew 26:14-27:66, Luke 221:23:56a) contains some early reflection on the theological significance of the suffering and crucifixion of Jesus. In Mark, an unnamed woman an alabaster jar of costly ointment, pouring the oil upon the head of Jesus as a sign of his royalty. Making no universal claim, and stressing the significance of this moment, she seized the moment. Mark has placed the incident where he has, as part of the passion narrative, to stress that she has anointed his body for burial, expanding upon the significance of the event. As they prepare for the observance of the Passover, Matthew adds that the time (καιρός) of the teacher is near (ἐγγύς). I discussed the last supper of Jesus with his disciples in my discussion of I Corinthians 11:23-26. The treachery of Judas is difficult to explain, especially when it is part of the plan of God. Without the hardened heart of the Pharaoh, there would never have been the solidifying of the Hebrew people and their deliverance. Without the unexplained, underhanded actions of Judas, the arrest and the ensuing Passion of Jesus, events would not have reflected the fulfillment of OT prophecies and the deliverance of all peoples in Christ would not have happened. Luke seeks to explain it by saying that Satan entered Judas. The story of opposition to Jesus reaches its climax as Satan uses one of his own disciples. As they take their places for the meal, and as they were eating, Jesus says one of them will betray him. The words of Jesus are not judgmental, but they do force Judas to take responsibility for his actions. The Son of Man goes as it is written, but woe is upon the one who betrays him. It would have been better for him not to have been born. Jesus experiences further isolation as in Luke the disciples argue over which of them is the greatest, leading Jesus to refer to his coming kingdom and the disciples joining him in the rule the Father confers. He experiences further isolation as his closest associates desert him. In Mark and Matthew, the prediction that all his disciples will desert him fulfills Zechariah 13:7, a passage that continues with the redemption of those who flee, saying that their desertion of Jesus is not the final word of their lives. In Luke, Jesus warns Simon that Satan the accuser has demanded to be allowed to sift Peter like wheat, but Jesus has prayed for him that his faith may not fail, so that when he turns back, he can strengthen his brothers and sisters. In Luke, the Satanic plot that began with Judas will overtake Peter as well. He connects the story of the betrayal by Judas and the story of the denial by Peter with the influence of Satan. The fact that all the disciples deny that they will desert Jesus shows their lack of self-knowledge. In Luke, the disciples note the presence of two swords, and with irony, recognizing the disciples still do not understand, Jesus says that is enough. The Gethsemane prayer shows the continued isolation of Jesus as he prays alone in agony that his suffering would pass, but that he will remain faithful to the will of his Father. Jesus tells them to stay awake and pray that may not succumb to the time of trail, as in the Lord’s Prayer concerning deliverance from the time of trial (Matthew 6:13, Luke 11:4). The disciples become an object lesson in what happens when one fails to stay awake as Jesus mentioned in sayings and parables with his injunction to watch rather than sleep (Mark 13:34-37=Matthew 25:13 and 24:42). Jesus’ withstanding temptation becomes an example to all in the face of their temptations. Jesus achieves a submission to the will of the Father through prayer and seeks the companionship with his disciples because he wants them to follow him, inculcating what he taught them in the Lord’s Prayer. Judas betrayed Jesus in a personal way, arriving in the Garden with overwhelming force and identifying by embracing him and kissing him on the cheek. The simple act of betrayal, of handing over those closest to us to suffering, is a potential within us all. All of us have the capacity for betraying our closest friends, our best self, and God.[74] Matthew says one of them cut off the ear of a slave of the high priest, Jesus tells them to put their swords away, for those who take the path of life by the sword will perish by the sword. In Luke, he picks up the ear and restores the ear to the soldier. Even in his arrest, he has compassion and forgiveness. As told by Luke, Jesus is very much in charge of the situation, even though authorities must arrest him. The plan of the Father is to find its fulfillment. Jesus appears here as ready to meet the fate that stands before him. Thus, the path of the Father is the path of the cross. The Father refuses to impose the divine will by force. Rather than the disciples using the sword, he could ask the Father to send legions of angels to correct this injustice. The reality is that the Father refuses to do so in every case, for the path the Father has chosen is not the conquest of all resistance to the will of the Father. However, despite all this, Jesus chose him as a disciple and allowed this betrayer, this rejected one, to hear and see the gospel. Mark adds the puzzling incident of a young man wearing only a linen cloth whom he soldiers caught, but he escaped naked, culminating the example of the failure of the closest associates of Jesus. In Mark and Matthew, Judas acts as his own judge and jury. By taking his own life, Judas concurs with Jesus’ own statement that it would be better for the betrayer to have never been born. In Luke, Jesus experiences further isolation as his captors immediately mock him. Jesus will stand before his human judges in both religious and political court. The Passion narrative will present Jesus as one innocent of the charges brought against him, thereby heightening our sense of the injustice of this moment. The veiled attack by Jesus on the temple would have been reason enough for a trial. The background of this trial is the word and deed of Jesus against the Temple. The High Priest wants Jesus to make an oath before the living God stating clearly to those who sit in judgment if he is the Messiah (Χριστὸς) [75] and in Mark the Son of the Blessed One, in Matthew the Son of God (Υἱὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ). Luke refers to both Messiah and Son of God. We know that the followers of Jesus proclaimed Jesus as the Jewish Messiah and the Son of God after his resurrection. We also know the references to Jesus as the Jewish Messiah are rare in the Gospel story, and when they do occur, Jesus has an ambiguous response to the title. It also seems clear that the Romans crucified Jesus with the mocking title of “King of the Jews.” Jesus refers to Daniel 7:13, saying on he will Son of Man (Υἱὸν τοῦ ἀνθρώπου) is seated at the right of Power coming in the clouds of heaven, with Matthew adding emphasizing that this will happen from this moment. Those who condemn him will know him as Lord of the universe and coming judge. Veiled in Jesus, the outcast from Nazareth, one who renounces violence and willingly accepts execution, is appointed Lord of the entire world. The phrasing here reflects the thinking of the Christian community of the 60s. The Gospel writes believed Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God, and the Son of Man, who was about to ascend to the right hand of the Father. The remarkable thing about the gospel narratives is that their authors do not make Jesus speak more directly and explicitly about the things they themselves believe. The focus of the questions is the relation of Jesus to the Father, and thus are Christological questions. The High Priest declaring that Jesus committed blasphemy (βλασφημίαν) suggests he thought of Jesus as a false prophet. In Deuteronomy 13: 5-6, the probability is that Jewish religious leaders suspected Jesus of being a deceiver who was leading people astray from traditional divine revelation, and therefore deserving of death. They did not enact judicial murder out of personal dislike of Jesus. They acted in good faith in regarding Jesus as a deceiver who was seducing the people into apostasy from the God of Israel along the lines expressed here. Deuteronomy 17:12 comes into play, where if anyone disobeys the priest, the person must die. We also need to point out that religious leaders who kill in the name of God is not new. The Roman Governor Pilate would betray his office by preferring political corrected of the crown to discharging the duty he had to dispense justice. Pilate asks Jesus if he is king of the Jews (Βασιλεὺς τῶν Ἰουδαίων), a title that corresponds to the title given by the magi in Matthew 2. There is no basis in the gospel story that Jesus thought of himself as king. Jesus is evasive in his response. Jesus is silent before his accusers, so much so that the governor is amazed. Luke adds a story of Jesus before Herod that indicates a rift between Herod and Pilate is reconciled. Both Herod and Pilate having Jesus beaten may be a warning to Jesus not to bother them further, since both planned upon his release. Pilate places him and Jesus who is called Messiah (Χριστόν) before the crowd. Matthew will heighten the tension in the choice between Jesus son of Abba and Jesus son of Mary and Joseph. Matthew adds an exchange between Pilate and his wife in which his wife says she had suffered due to a dream, and she warned him to have nothing to do with that innocent man. The incident gives a ray of hope that will quickly disappear. The priests and elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas, and therefore, for Jesus to be killed. When Pilate asks the crowd what they want him to do with Jesus, they declare they want him crucified. In asking them what Jesus had done, Pilate recognizes the basis for the antagonism Jewish authorities had toward Jesus. In Mark 15:14, Matthew 27:24-26, Luke 23:25, John 19:16, Pilate hands Jesus over for crucifixion. Matthew adds that Pilate declares him innocent, and the people respond that the blood of this innocent man bet upon them and their children. Matthew has in mind that the Jewish people were judged by God in 70 AD with the destruction of the Temple for what they did not Jesus in 30 AD. Later Christian generations made this statement apply to Jews throughout history, an interpretation that has caused great pain in their relationship. We cannot speak of a guilt of the Jewish people for the death of Jesus, despite verse 25. Even if in the debates about the release of a condemned person the crowd did utter this terrible curse, is God going to hold the crowd and the whole people to it?[76] Christian charges of deicide against the Jewish people as a seal of its definitive rejection by God ought never to have arisen. The churches have rightly distanced themselves from them, even if too late, but with an expression of shame at the long and painful history of Christian relations to the Jewish people. Charges of this kind have poisoned such relations.[77] Under orchestrated pressure, Pilate yielded to the will of the Jewish authorities rather than have public trouble over an issue in which he had little interest. When Pilate finally delivers his sentence, he comes across as a weak, cowardly man. In Mark 15:16-20 and Matthew 27:27-31, the soldiers mock Jesus by stripping him naked, putting a scarlet robe on him, constructed a crown of thorns for his head (Zechariah 6:11), placed a reed in his right hand, and knelt before him and mocked him by hailing him as king of the Jews (Βασιλεῦ τῶν Ἰουδαίων). There is no evidence Jesus aspired to be king. They heaped shame upon him, took off the purple robe and put his own clothes on him, and led him away for crucifixion. In Luke, Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing and the final prayer Father, in to your hands I commend my spirit, are a bracket for the Crucifixion. . Being able to forgive the people who have unjustly accused you, mocked you, treated you with contempt, tortured you and crucified you, is an amazing moment. Such forgiveness knows that one best overcomes evil by good. The ironic truth of the taunts is that those who mock him declare his messianic identity and the saving significance of his death. Luke adds that in fulfillment of Psalm 22:18 they divided his clothing and in fulfillment of Psalm 22:7 they scoffed at him. Luke adds that the soldiers mocked him, fulfilling Psalm 69:7ff. Death exposed his finitude and his punishment as a sinner. He suffered in our place as sinners. He suffered a fate he did not deserve, even while those who killed him deserved such a death.[78] Matthew sees Jesus here as the righteous sufferer mocked by the world. With his entire life, he has done precisely what scorn is heaped on him for: he has trusted in God, thus keeping the first commandment. In Luke, the criminal proclaims the innocence of Jesus. The fact that the criminal will on the cross will be with Jesus in paradise is a promise of friendship. The curtain of the temple tearing in two, symbolizing the immediate access to God that the death of Jesus brings, Jesus serenely dies, commending his spirit to the Father. In Luke 9:44, Jesus says the Son of Man will be handed over to people. Now, he is in the hands of the Father. The centurion is the last to declare Jesus' innocence. Of the Gospels, only Luke says that the people regretted what happened. What Jesus accomplished by his death is the salvation of humanity. Jesus addresses God as Father, as he did in the Lord’s Prayer. His last words from the cross are for his Father to receive his spirit. If you think about, these two prayers address his relationship with his opponents, for whom he wanted divine forgiveness, and his relationship with God, with whom he had abiding fellowship. In sharp contrast is Mark 15:33-41, Matthew 27:45-54, we find the last words of Jesus and his death. Jesus cried with a loud voice with the words of Psalm 22:1, Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani, or My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Of greater interest to us is the silence of the Father in the suffering of the Son. The nature of divine action can be difficult to express. The problem arises in part because of the silence of God while creation and human history is so full of suffering. The silence of God in the presence of so much evil and suffering always makes the denial of the lordship of God over creation a possibility. The absurdity of suffering and wickedness provide material enough for atheism when it comes to the postulate of a loving and wise Creator. The debatable quality of the affirmation of the reality of God is something any theology must maintain throughout its presentation. If we cannot locate a divine word in history, then we must reckon with the divine silence over human life and history. The cross is a reminder that we may hear only silence.[79] The crucifixion alone writes a human “No” over the life of Jesus. Since he spoke of the nearness of God, the crucifixion offers a “No” from God. The silence of God is deafening in the crucifixion. The silence of the Father as Jesus suffers upon the cross is deafening. It brings the deity of the Father and the power of the life-giving Spirit into question. The silence of the Father at this moment in the life of Jesus is a parable of the silence of the Father to all human suffering. Our suffering reminds us that we are little more than small, trembling, and weak animals that decay and die. Given the way Jesus lived his life, the cruelest aspect of the end of his life was the silence of God. God appears to have forsaken him in that moment. Jesus affirms that God has abandoned him. The cross invites us to ponder a painful reality. Death could bring only silence, emptiness, nothingness, and loss. Matthew will describe certain effects of the crucifixion which amount to phenomena that provide a theological interpretation of the import of the death of Jesus in the language of apocalyptic. The curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks split. In the imagery of the vision of the valley of dry bones in Ezekiel 37, the tombs opened, and many bodies of the deceased saints arose from their sleep. After the resurrection of Jesus, a considerable number of saints entered the city and appeared to many. Death has been robbed of its power. Matthew envisions continuity with the best of the Old Testament and Jewish expressions of faith into the newly formed Christian community. Mark and Matthew relate the confession of faith by Gentile Roman soldiers as they witness the crucifixion, saw the earthquake, and were terrified, professing that truly this man was the Son of God (Θεοῦ Υἱὸς). Matthew tries to do the impossible by offering proof of the resurrection of Jesus with his story of guards posted at the tomb of Jesus. The point of the story of his burial is that he truly died, as will all of us. Throughout the story of the trial and crucifixion, we see humanity at its worst. The Christian doctrine of sin arises out of reflection upon what the cross says about us. It frees us from delusion about our perfectible. To read this narrative is to see sin and evil as unnatural, a disorder, and a perversion, but one that keeps repeating itself in every culture throughout history. Sin shows itself in the fact that we are self-deceiving people who find it difficult to tell the truth about ourselves. In the cross, we see a mirror of who we are. Our sin is more incurable because we do not view ourselves as sinners.[80] Our inclination is toward hypocrisy, which is an empty image of righteousness. We will not have clear knowledge of self until we see the meaning of the cross.[81] We learn something else as we ponder the cross. We come upon a great irony of self-deception. Self-deception often arises out of our desire to be good and moral people. People who take their moral commitments seriously are the one who are most prone to deceive themselves about their moral commitments.
John 18:1-19:42 is the passion narrative in John. One easily misunderstood element of the Passion in John is the group labeled simply “the Jews.” It distinguishes John’s cast of characters from the synoptic gospels. While the synoptic authors usually define Jesus’ interlocutors more specifically — scribes, Pharisees, chief priests, elders, Herodians, etc. — John pits Jesus against “the Jews” and sometimes against “the world.” Indeed, the Passion Narrative in John will bring the Jews and the world together in the answer Jesus gives to Pilate: “If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews” (18:36). The Jews thus travel through John’s gospel as a corporate character, one that appears quite frequently in the passion narrative (about 20 times). Any pastor today needs to offer a faithful interpretation of this narrative without promoting antipathy toward Jews and Judaism. To read this story of John is to read about people who make a judgment about Jesus. The disciples have already fled, leaving Jesus alone. Jewish religious leaders have decided he has broken Jewish laws so thoroughly that he deserves death. Pilate is trying to do something to keep the Jewish crowds quiet. The crowds would rather have the bandit Barabbas freed than they would Jesus. As I Timothy 6:13 puts it, “Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession.” John provides some reflections on the nature of that “good confession.” Jesus does not offer a defense. Jesus did not owe Pilate any defense. He offered only a confession. By offering this confession, he also showed the limits of political power.[82] In the Gospel of John, Jesus has said little about the kingdom of God, although he does have concern that people might make him king. Pilate wants to keep the conversation in terms of power. Which one of us has the power here? Are you king of the Jews (Βασιλεὺς τῶν Ἰουδαίων)? In John 6:15, the people tried to make him a king, which is the basis for the question of Pilate. By forcefully claiming a kingdom "not from this world," Jesus defines the nature of his messianic identity. As proof, Jesus points out that he has no soldiers, no armies, and no lawyers that are fighting for his freedom. Jewish leaders were waiting for a Davidic messiah another glorious warrior king who would free them from exile to a renewed position as the holy kingdom of Israel. This is not Jesus' identity or intent. Jesus told Peter to put away his sword. For John, the kingship of Jesus is a theological category that redefines the understanding of power of the world. We saw that understanding at work with the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem, as the disciples spread palm branches along the way, proclaiming, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord – the king of Israel.” The point here, in contrast, is that any power Jesus comes from God, not military might or human institutions. Because of this, in the world, the kingdom is inconsiderable and from a human point of view and insignificant kingdom. Even in John, the focus on the concealed or hidden nature of the king and kingdom. Pilate asks if he is a king. Pilate is powerful, with Roman armies backing him. He stands strong before Jesus of Nazareth. He knows the power of the sword and the power of Rome in this part of the world, propped up by violence. The concern of Pilate is here. He wants to know if Jesus is the type of king that threatens Rome. Political and military power is the concern of Pilate. Jesus wants to speak in terms of truth. In fact, his “job description,” if you please, the reason God made him and the purpose God has for him, is to testify to truth. Those who listen to the truth hear his voice. Those who are part of his kingdom listen to his voice. Pilate, the representative of power, will use force. The truth, Jesus, who earlier in this gospel said, “I am the Way, I am truth and life,” uses “voice.” Pilate wants to talk about the claim of Jesus to "kingship." Jesus instead talks about "truth." Power (Pilate) uses force, but the truth (Jesus) uses a voice. Pilate wants to know “what” truth is, when what he needs is to know “who” truth is. Pilate wants to keep the conversation in terms of power. Which one of us has the power here? In 18:37, he asks, “Are you a king?” From where do you get your power? However, Jesus wants to speak in terms of truth. “I came into the world for this, to bear witness to the truth …” Earthly political power is not the measure of this king and this kingdom. Rather, the measure is the universal desire human beings have for truth. The power of Jesus is his testimony to the truth. John already indicated this in John 1:14, where the Word is “full of grace and truth.” He also indicated this in John 14:6, where Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” The world of ideas, the world beyond practical power struggles, is so foreign to Pilate that he must even ask for help, “What is truth?” (v. 38). The two dialogues between Jesus and Pilate in John 18 and 19 are thus a great example of the confrontation between truth and power. We are not dealing with a question of idly speculative interest. Nor is it an attempt to back up the certainty of faith and proclamation. The truth for which humanity longs is in the act of God in Jesus Christ for us. Truth is the disclosure and recognition of that which is as it appears to humanity, of that which humanity cannot live without. When we encounter that which is, we attain to truth in the sense of disclosure and recognition. Hearing his voice is to be of the truth. We must accept His voice as the voice that speaks of Christ as that which appears as such. Christian experience can be truth and of the truth, but not so in abstraction. It is true to the extent that it proceeds from the truth. Truth rests upon what we learn of Christ.[83] The irony of this text is that Jesus was not on trial. Throughout the passion narrative, in fact, the disciples, the religious leaders, Pilate, and the crowds are all on trial before God. Of course, so are we as we engage this story. John follows the typology of Isaac carrying his own wood to the altar for sacrifice. He also emphasizes that Jesus is master of his fate. He was crucified between two thieves, but on his cross was an inscription: “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews (ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ ΤΩΝ ΙΟΥΔΑΙΩΝ), written in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek. Jewish leads wanted to add that this man said he was such a king, but Pilate let his statement remain. Pilate becomes an unwilling witness to the authority of Christ. The cross itself becomes such a testimony, “lifting up” the Son of Man in this way. John may well want his readers to know that some followers of Jesus did not abandon him. Near the cross were his mother, has aunt, Mary the wife of Clopas, Mary Magdalene, the Beloved Disciple. He told Mary that the Beloved Disciple is her son, and he told the Beloved Disciple that Mary is her mother. The Beloved Disciple would care for Mary. Although one could refer to the simple provision for the mother of Jesus, one could also understand this conversation as a provision for future believers and for the church. Jesus provides for the future. As Eve was the mother of humanity, Mary is the mother of the newly forming people of God who have responded to the revelation of God in Jesus. Soldiers see Jesus was already dead. Piercing his side with a spear, blood and water came out, the water symbolizing living water and the waters of baptism, while blood coming from his body symbolizing the Eucharist.
[1] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 335.
[2] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 423, 425.
[3] Barth, Church Dogmatics III.4 [56.3] 675.
[4] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume III, 183-187, 193-94.
[5] Pannenberg, Jesus God and Man, 197.
[6] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology, Volume III, 12.
[7] I Corinthians 12:3
no one can say "Jesus is Lord" except by the Holy Spirit.
II Corinthians 4:5
For we do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus' sake.
Philippians 2:11
every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Colossians 2:6
As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him …
[8] Bultmann believes it is a cult legend formed in Hellenistic circles. Taylor believes the vocabulary, style, and ideas are Jewish. It is Palestinian in origin. For the Jesus Seminar, Christian elements overlay the story.
[9] Mark Searle Liturgy Made Simple (Collegeville, Minn.; The Liturgical Press, 1981).
[10] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 418.
[11] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 433.
[12] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 465
[13] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 306.
[14] Barth, Church Dogmatics III.2 [47.1] 502.
[15] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 433-4.
[16] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 425-6.
[17] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 427.
[18] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 1, 421.
[19]
[20] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 452.
[21] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 283..
[22] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 428.
[23] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 369.
[24] Richard Rohr, Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self (Jossey-Bass, 2012), xix-xx.
[25] Barth, Church Dogmatics, I.2 [15.2], 158.
[26] Barth, Church Dogmatics, IV.1, 59.2, 260.
[27] (Craig Koester, "Hebrews," Anchor Bible, v. 36 [New York: Doubleday, 2001], 299).
[28] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 1, 266.
[29] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 1, 306.
[30] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 457.
[31] (J. C. O'Neill, Westminster Dictionary of Christian Theology [Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1983].)
[32] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 455.
[33] Barth (Church Dogmatics III.2 [47], p. 459-461)
[34] Barth (Church Dogmatics, III.2, [47], 461)
[35] John Wesley gives a long description of this self-knowledge in sermons 14 and 15.
[36] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 245.
[37] Barth (Church Dogmatics, III.2 [47], 461)
[38] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 416.
[39] (Barth, 2004, 1932-67), IV.2 [60.2] 421.
[40] (Barth, 2004, 1932-67) IV.1 [63.1] 744.
[41] (Barth, 2004, 1932-67) IV.3 [71.6] 652.
[42] Pannenberg Systematic Theology Volume 2, 374-5.
[43] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 249.
[44] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 114.
[45] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 416.
[46] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 342.
[47] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 368.
[48] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology, Volume I, 259.
[49] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 339, referring to Sanders, Jesus and Judaism, 61-9i0, 301-5, 334-5.
[50] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 398.
[51] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 295.
[52] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 225-6.
[53] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 1, 427.
[54] Barth, CD, IV.1, 58.2, 111.
[55] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 347.
[56] Barth, CD I.2, 18.2, 378.
[57] Barth, CD, II.2, 32.1, 26-7.
[58] Barth, CD, IV.1, 57.3, 70-1.
[59] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 1, 358.
[60] Barth, CD, IV.1, 57.3, 72-3.
[61] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 183.
[62] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 369.
[63] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology volume 2, 441.
[64] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 320.
[65] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 347.
[66] Barth (Church Dogmatics, II.1 (31), 481)
[67] Pannenberg Systematic Theology Volume 1, 382-3.
[68] Pannenberg Systematic Theology Volume 1, 400.
[69] Barth (Church Dogmatics, III.4 [56.1], 594)
[70] Schleiermacher, Christian Faith, 158.2/3.
[71] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 534-5.
[72] Barth (Church Dogmatics, IV.2, [64.3], 227)
[73](see David R. Bauer, "Matthew," in the Asbury Bible Commentary [Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1992]).
[74] Inspired by —Henri Nouwen, Bread for the Journey (Zondervan, 2006), 71.
[75] To the sparsity of the fewer than thirty references in three hundred years should be added the fact that although Josephus describes all sorts of historical figures, such as prophets, would-be kings, priests, agitators, in the first century, he never calls one of them a Messiah. If we take at face value later rabbinic references, they tell us that Rabbi Aquiba hailed Simon ben Kosiba as the Messiah in 130 AD, but before him in these centuries there seems to be no identifiable Jew hailed a kingly Messiah other than Jesus of Nazareth. There was not a single national expectation of the Messiah.
[76] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 341.
[77] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 343.
[78] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 374.
[79] (Rahner, Hearer of the Word: Laying the Foundation for a Philosophy of Religion 1994, 1941), Part III.
[80] – Augustine, The Confessions, Book 2
[81] John Calvin (Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book I, Chapter 2, pp. 37–38.)
[82] Barth, Church Dogmatics, IV.2 [64.3], 176.
[83] Barth, Church Dogmatics, IV.1 [59.2] 249.
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