Wednesday, August 24th, 2005
From then on, Jesus began telling his disciples what would happen to him. He said, “I must go to Jerusalem. There the nation’s leaders, the chief priests, and the teachers of the Law of Moses will make me suffer terribly. I will be killed, but three days later I will rise to life.”
Peter took Jesus aside and told him to stop talking like that. He said, “God would never let this happen to you, Lord!” Jesus turned to Peter and said, “Satan, get away from me! You’re in my way because you think like everyone else and not like God.”
Then Jesus said to his disciples: If any of you want to be my followers, you must forget about yourself. You must take up your cross and follow me. If you want to save your life, you will destroy it. But if you give up your life for me, you will find it. What will you gain, if you own the whole world but destroy yourself? What would you give to get back your soul?
The Son of Man will soon come in the glory of his Father and with his angels to reward all people for what they have done. I promise you that some of those standing here will not die before they see the Son of Man coming with his kingdom.
Matthew 16:21-28 Contemporary English Version
Jesus shows us one of the hallmarks of emotional intelligence - the capacity to choose the road of suffering and difficulty in the interest of a greater good.
NT Wright, in his lecture, “Jesus and the cross” (pdf or mp3), unpacks the reality that Jesus faced as he walked towards the cross. Taking on the role of Messiah was integrally linked with his impending death on the cross and resurrection. And the greater good would have implications for the Jewish people still reeling from the impact of exile.
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Wednesday, August 17th, 2005
When Jesus and his disciples were near the town of Caesarea Philippi, he asked them, “What do people say about the Son of Man?” The disciples answered, “Some people say you are John the Baptist or maybe Elijah or Jeremiah or some other prophet.” Then Jesus asked them, “But who do you say I am?” Simon Peter spoke up, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” Jesus told him: Simon, son of Jonah, you are blessed! You didn’t discover this on your own. It was shown to you by my Father in heaven. So I will call you Peter, which means “a rock.” On this rock I will build my church, and death itself will not have any power over it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and God in heaven will allow whatever you allow on earth. But he will not allow anything that you don’t allow. Jesus told his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah.
Matthew 16:13-20 Contemporary English Version
I remember a great retelling of this story as told by Joe Garlington back in the early 1980s. Here’s how it goes:
Peter replied, “You are the eschatological manifestation of the ground of our being, the kerygma of which we find the ultimate meaning in our interpersonal relationships.” And Jesus said, “What?”
—–
There’s a more sophisticated version, probably only appreciated by theologians…
Karl Barth, Paul Tillich, Reinhold Niebuhr, and James Cone find themselves all at the same time at Caesarea Philippi. Who should come along but Jesus, and he asks the four famous theologians the same Christological question, “Who do you say that I am?”
Karl Barth stands up and says: “You are the totaliter aliter, the vestigious trinitatum who speaks to us in the modality of Christo-monism.”
Not prepared for Barth’s brevity, Paul Tillich stumbles out: “You are he who heals our ambiguities and overcomes the split of angst and existential estrangement; you are he who speaks of the theonomous viewpoint of the analogia entis, the analogy of our being and the ground of all possibilities.”
Reinhold Niebuhr gives a cough for effect and says, in one breath: “You are the impossible possibility who brings to us, your children of light and children of darkness, the overwhelming oughtness in the midst of our fraught condition of estrangement and brokenness in the contiguity and existential anxieties of our ontological relationships.”
Finally James Cone gets up, and raises his voice: “You are my Oppressed One, my soul’s shalom, the One who was, who is, and who shall be, who has never left us alone in the struggle, the event of liberation in the lives of the oppressed struggling for freedom, and whose blackness is both literal and symbolic.”
And Jesus says, “What the!?!”
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Saturday, August 13th, 2005
Jesus left and went to the territory near the cities of Tyre and Sidon.
Suddenly a Canaanite woman from there came out shouting, “Lord and Son of David, have pity on me! My daughter is full of demons.” Jesus did not say a word. But the woman kept following along and shouting, so his disciples came up and asked him to send her away. Jesus said, “I was sent only to the people of Israel! They are like a flock of lost sheep.” The woman came closer. Then she knelt down and begged, “Please help me, Lord!” Jesus replied, “It isn’t right to take food away from children and feed it to dogs.” “Lord, that’s true,” the woman said, “but even dogs get the crumbs that fall from their owner’s table.” Jesus answered, “Dear woman, you really do have a lot of faith, and you will be given what you want.” At that moment her daughter was healed.
Matthew 15: 21-28 (Contemporary English Version)
This could be a disturbing story.
On the one hand is the thought that Jesus could be so rude. From the perspective of the worldview I’m in, Jesus comes across here as parochial, xenophobic almost. But so does the dominant culture in which Jesus lived. There was a sense of God’s favour resting on the chosen people only. Other people are seen as dogs, unclean outsiders.
Some might say that Jesus here is just testing the woman, to see if she has enough faith to break through the cultural barriers that would prevent her from experiencing God’s grace.
On the other hand is the possibility that Jesus is on a learning curve. He’s been confronted by someone who takes him at his word and now challenges him to be consistent. After all Jesus has been talking about purity coming from inner attitudes rather than outward cultural habits.
What I see here is the dynamic exploration of his mission. It reminds me of the emergence of calling portrayed in The Last Temptation of Christ, in which Jesus starts off with the angry prophetic approach shared with John the Baptist. He moves on to the development of the importance of loving relationships. Finally he discovers the call to walk towards the cross.
Dynamic discovery of mission challenges the expectation that Jesus was inerrant and infallible. If we run with Jesus being without sin we have to think carefully about what we mean by that. Jesus would have learnt from experience like anybody else. As a child he would have stumbled as he learnt to walk. As a carpenter he would have gradually improved in competence. As a preacher he would have developed his skills of communication, learning from responses in the crowd.
Of course the good news here is that Jesus is prepared to work cross culturally. He’s open to dialogue. He’s able to honour faith from anyone, no matter what ethnic background they come from. He’s prepared to break out of the classic expectations around what he will do and with whom he will relate.
Take a look at Darren Wright’s post on “The Thing About Dogs“.
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