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Jesus…raised from the dead.
The resurrection is the clearest and most definite evidence we have that Jesus was and is fully God. I would go so far as to say everything done in Jesus’ life is worthless if not for the resurrection. Son of God? Maybe…the centurion at the cross declared Jesus as “a son of God” (that’s right, your translations of the Bible interpret things for you more than you know), but this proclamation, or kerygma, is simply vapor, lost in the wind if Jesus does not resurrect.
Let me try to explain with an illustration. If I live my entire life working and striving under the assumption that before I retire I’ll be able to build a dream home and live there until I die; but instead, I find myself at the ripe age of 70 breathing with the support of an oxygen tank in a nursing home, broke and alone, all of my efforts have been for naught. Should I achieve the dream home and find myself surrounded by my children and their children at the ripe age of 85, I am fulfilled. (Please disregard the faults of such an illustration, I’m trying to make a point)
Jesus lived life in faith. His faith was “confidence in what [He] hop[ed] for and assurance about what [He did] not see.” Jesus was sure from the start of the resurrection, and in sight of it, Jesus makes sense. If we assume our Experience is absolute then we are left to excuse the resurrection, somehow explaining it away like the Romans and Jewish leaders tried to do. But this is why the Gospel becomes “good news,” why we can be the Eucharist to the world, and why we are confident in Jesus, because of His resurrection.
Another illustration: I recently read an article about a guy who has, for years, been handing out pamphlets to jurors outside of a courthouse. These pamphlets encouraged the jurors to judge with their conscience rather than what the law says. He is now on trial for tampering with the jury(ies). But what’s funny about this is, as far as I know, he did not single out one type of jury or certain types of cases! The guy is simply making an effort to reform the way juries think and judge, because the law can be nonsensical.
This is a perfect illustration for the Powers in operation. Resist or expose them and they will do everything within their means to do violence to your social, political, financial, personal, relational, and spiritual life. Jesus does this. Exposing what is at best a misinterpretation of the Jewish leaders and at worst, a perversion of the Scripture for their own affluence and control. But you have to see this, the Powers are not the leaders, they are not the state charging a guy with tampering, the Powers are those metaphysical forms that dictate a reaction to resistance and exposure. It may come in the form of critique, criticism, violence, or even death, but be sure, the Powers’ response to resistance is control.
The argument is not for chaos or anarchy though, the argument is that only God is God and only Jesus is Lord. Jesus came preaching the Kingdom of God, which, once again, makes no sense in a world without resurrection. Jesus’ call is the carry the cross daily, but in a world where death is the final bow on this stage of life, there is little sense in the cross. Jesus dead just means Jesus failed.
It is important, I think to differentiate between Hell and Hades. Hell is a lake of burning sulfer…Hades is the proverbial Grave, a hole in the ground where rot and decay are your only friends and God has turned His face away. Jesus descended into Hades, the place of death. That place that is the end of all who resist the Powers. Until the resurrection, there is no escaping Hades. It is for all people, no matter how righteous. However, it is the ultimate threat the Powers have. So we come to realize that in Jesus’ innocent death, the Powers are exposed for what they are in their evil, perverse and controlling ways; but, in Jesus’ resurrection we understand the Kingdom of God can be enacted in the here and now with no fear of death. Death is like your mother’s spankings once you turned 20…it may be unpleasant, but it is futile.
As you may be able to tell, this is my understanding of the atonement, that in Christ we live, move and breath, free from the threats of death and destruction. This means that we will experience more death though in our lives. When the Powers are challenged, brothers kill brothers, mothers disown children, and credentials are never to be found. Death is never the ally, but like a house built on a rock near the shore, we should experience a consistent and enduring clash of waves on our walls. We must remember though that the arbiters of the Powers are not the enemy, but that the Powers and principalities are.
What does it mean to have faith in Jesus? It means to practice resurrection, to expose the Powers, envision a Kingdom of God future, and then enact it. But how?
I have several movies I would consider among my favorites. One such movie is V for Vendetta. Every year the 5th of November comes around I get excited to sit down and watch V once again bring down a government based on fear and manipulate. I love seeing the realization come to him that he has, in fact, become a monster in reaction to the monstrous things done to him. The move from pointing fingers to self-criticism; yet, the necessary actions are still called for.
Many quotes come to mind, but the one that has weighed on me this year is a line coming from the infamous Chancellor Sutler. As the Summer gets into full swing, the high profile leaders start to get antsy, realizing that November is fast approaching. The Chancellor begins giving his orders and as he is giving them, his agitation grows, until he wraps up saying, “I want them to remember why THEY NEED US!”
Art History tends to revolve around the Church a lot, especially when dealing with the first millennium AD/CE. Around the year 1000, the Church spread the word that Christ would be returning in the year 1000. Of course, the year came and went. Disillusioned, the populace, illiterate and without any consolidated government, started to become more fragmented. For whatever purpose, the pope instituted two things, the Crusade and the Christian pilgrimage. As people would travel across the countryside, they would come to monasteries doubling as hostels and places to come in contact with relics of saints and martyrs. The message sent through sculpture was clear though, “Christ is coming back. Are you ready?” Simply put, “Turn or burn.” Looking back on this time in Church history, it seems to me that the populace was being reminded by the pope and monasteries of “why THEY NEED US.”
Somehow, it seems the gospel I have most heard in my life has been the “Turn or burn” gospel. There is little need for this gospel apart from one’s deathbed (to which Kurt Cameron replies, “You never know when you’ll die, best to be ready,” but this is just a manipulation of people’s fears…a gospel based on fear). But this is the gospel that the Church most seems to congregate around…perhaps it’s easier to comprehend? Or maybe it’s simply because it reminds the Church of “why THEY NEED US.”
Sadly, I am afraid Jesus’ Gospel is much more complex (much like sand is more complex than a boulder). Jesus’ table tends to blur the lines between THEM and US…to the point that it is the Zacchaeus-es of the world that provide Jesus with a place to eat and rest His head (mainly because Jesus has probably so offended the average synagogue-goer that He was sub-contextually uninvited). If you are automatically turned off by a critique of the Church, I seriously doubt your understanding of Jesus! If your church is the best of places, maybe it’s because you haven’t given thought to who would be unwelcome there. I mean, if a pastor from an unheard of denomination came into your church service, threw the offering plates on the floor during the offertory and began declaring God’s displeasure with the show and pretense of your church meetings and Bible studies, I don’t think anyone’s first response is, “Surely this is the Son of God,” let alone “You know, he’s right.” Fact is, the world doesn’t need us, it needs a Savior, we’re just supposed to be showing them Him (and how can we show Him when we wouldn’t even recognize Him?). You can shake your head all you’d like, but in the end your reasons become “why THEY NEED US.”
Do I suggest that we need them? No. That doesn’t solve the problem.
Instead, let us realize (because I have not come to this realization anymore than you have) that God descended to the earth and took on flesh to be counted one of us. No matter where you stand, attend church, drink your beer, buy your illegal drugs, or do any other number of bigoted, violent, grotesque things God sat down at a table and that poses us all with the same problem…that WE NEED GOD. There is no US and THEM, there is only sitting at God’s table and the refusal of some to scoot over, push two tables together, or even invite others. If we bring another table over there might not be enough food^, or we may not get to sit as close as we would like to our Rabbi*. Perhaps it is as simple as those other disciples have pushed and shoved their way in, so we understand them to be less humble than real disciples of Christ. If only they would take our lead for once, they would become better disciples, which is “why THEY NEED US.”
Finally, I wonder if God is allowed (by which I mean, “I wonder if we allow God to work…”) to work in and through them. “No,” say we, “only in a story told by Jesus would a Samaritan help a stranger.” I begin to wonder if we sat at Jesus’ table for awhile if we would find reasons why WE NEED THEM. Perhaps, God would use those who are not welcome at our table to teach us something about this Gospel of Jesus Christ. What would it mean for us to realize that this or that group of people love one another in such a way that is more authentic than any facade we’ve seen in the organized church? Maybe we come to the understanding that we will always group ourselves and everyone else into US and THEM categories, but what would it mean to break those categories in acting out the Gospel? Could it be that when we break these categories, we find instances where WE NEED US because WE NEED GOD, together?
Think.
Speak.
^ Ironically, there may not be enough food to bring another table over, but we’ll definitely make sure our table is nice, with the right color of table carpet…I mean clothe…and we’ll even go into debt building and re-building a genuinely magnificent table, with all the right carvings. Only to find out Jesus went and sat at another table. All our effort perfecting and keeping our table in good shape distracted us from what Jesus actually came for.
* I always wondered what it would be like to have been one of Jesus’ disciples who weren’t really mentioned except for in passing. You think they felt any farther from Jesus than the rest? Or is it just that they didn’t argue AS MUCH about positions of authority and other such things?
There must be the clarification that in speaking of Jesus’ table, I am speaking of the meal habits of Jesus. While we often refer to the Last Supper as the point at which Jesus instituted the Eucharist, it would be naive to think Jesus was not practicing the “good gift” all along.
As with any good theology, God is the initiator of this relationship. No one comes to Jesus’ table uninvited or unwelcome. Even those who invite Jesus to their tables, normally do so with ulterior motives. But even these invitations are a response to Jesus’ call to “come follow.” You see, Jesus does not fear letting someone else host the supper, but somehow, He seems to invite or attract the wrong kind of people. Jesus’ disciples were a motley crew of tax collectors, zealots and fisherman. Jesus would probably be known as a sort of “pied piper” to the unclean, sick and “fringe” Jews. When Jesus invites a person to eat with Him, it is not because that person is deserving, but because Jesus is here to bring the living water to those who need it; it is because at Jesus’ table all are undeserving, all are offered life and all have the opportunity to engage with this Rabbi.
How can I express this to you? For the Church to be the Church, our arms must be open, our invitations extended to anyone gladly and joyfully because we know we do not deserve the privilege, our buildings must be made vulnerable, our belongings must be forfeit to the others who do not deserve to be invited. Who am I to think it responsible to do less than Jesus? Who am I that I refuse Jesus’ dinner-guests? You see, a church that practices Eucharist never publishes a sponsor list, never pats a tither on the back while ignoring others who do not. This is not a tolerant Gospel, this is the love of Christ that levels the playing field. This is not about inviting your political counterpart over for Bible study to convince them of your way, this is about loving the unlovable because Christ loves us, the unlovables.
I do not know how to avoid our audacious American attitude of entitlement, but even if a man grew the straw, made bricks by hand, laid them one by one with mortar and custom built all of the components of a church building, he would be no more qualified to come to worship than the ungrateful, bitter and abusive father of four. I know it sounds extreme, but if this idea of entitlement, of hierarchy amongst givers and of misguided attempts to reform culture by our own power (whether by force, voice, or moral manipulation) come from organized religion, it would be better that the Church never became an organization. When the “necessary evils” have come to distort what it is we should be (a Eucharistic Body) we are no longer inviting others to Jesus’ table; instead, we savor our elbow room and hope that Jesus shows up from time to time.
How far did Jesus go? He spoke to a Samaritan woman, He invited Himself to Zaccheaus’ house, He ‘desecrated’ the one place people thought God was, He touched lepers, He dined with His betrayer, and He died a traitor’s death. Yes, Jesus rose from the dead as well, but then again, when was the last time I acted as though I believed that? Yet all of our excuses are null and void in sight of the resurrection. So, what about you? Who are you eating with?
Think.
Speak.
We have covered this in essence, but to recap…within the 2nd Temple Period, Jesus is sent into the world. Within this context there were many different groups among the Jews, all with an opinion on how best to preserve or restore the holiness of God’s people as well as God’s land. It is on a certain group we Christians most often focus and so demonize, they are the Pharisees. Ironically, most of the Protestant church of today subscribes to much the same theology of holiness as did the Pharisees. Now before I am misread, I must be sure to make it clear, the Pharisees saw Israel as a nation and people called to be a priestly nation. That’s Biblical. It was from this call that the Pharisees decided that to be a priestly people, all of God’s children must follow the purity rules for priests. This would be their act of faith, and they would say that when Israel came as a people to God’s throne as a holy, priestly nation, God will deliver them from Rome and sanctify the Land again. In contrast to our ideas of eschatology, I testify to the fact that we are similar to the Pharisees in this notion of holiness. We come to think that our righteousness will qualify us for holiness, rather than the other way around.
This background is essential to understanding what is happening at every meal scene in the Gospels; not just the Last Supper, but every meal. Because the Pharisees saw every meal as the one place, the beginning place to take a stand on holiness. At a Pharisee’s table, one would be sure to follow every purity rule, because if one does not, they are profaned, the table is profaned and the people at the table are profaned. How could a nation priests allow defilement among themselves? Especially in something as simple as a sacred meal, which is every meal for a priest and so for a Pharisee. At their tables, the identity of Israel was at stake. The table was a microcosm of the holy nation of God.
This is why Jesus’ meal practices were so disturbing to the Pharisees. He ate and drank enough to be called a drunkard and a glutton, which in the least shows a disregard for prim and pure way of dining. Hopefully over the next few posts, I will be exploring what it might mean for Jesus’ table to be the microcosm of the Church. I have heard too many sermons that do not offend the listener because it does not meet them where they are. If I do or don’t know you, I hope to at the very least challenge your predisposition towards what this religious thing should be all about for those who name themselves Christ-people.
Note: It has just struck me, that in His prophetic table habits, Jesus reached out more to the religious community than those on the fringe. By that I mean, while the Pharisees focused on keeping their table’s sanctified, Jesus’ Gospel was so much bigger; yet, it was not on this level that He offended or provoked the Pharisees. Instead, Jesus upset their system and used their daily blind eye to injustice as a call to repent. Where do we find ‘tables’ in our day? Could it be our 9 to 12 Sunday mornings? Our sanctuaries? Our church buildings?
Think.
Speak.
