What Jesus Meant

went a different way,...neglecting (no doubt) the family business of cabinetmaking.... Though we are not explicitly told anything about "the hidden years" beyond Luke's description of his running away from his parents when he was twelve, the stance of the rebel who would not be contained in the expectations of his hometown comes out again and again when family ties are mentioned. (6, 7)

Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill.... For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous.... For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. (Matt. 5:17, Rom. 5:19; Heb. 5:14)

"Whoever has no sword is to sell his coat and buy one. For I tell you that this which is written must be fulfilled in Me, 'And He was numbered with transgressors'; for that which refers to Me has its fulfillment." They said, "Lord, look, here are two swords." And He said to them, "It is enough." (Luke 22:35ff.)

Why did the payment [of sin] include Jesus' death, and such a horrible death? Was the creditor so exacting? Behind this conclusion lies the imagery of an angry God, hard to appease but by the most terrible of sacrifices. This is a view that some people call 'gruesome.'... If we talk of salvation as sacrificial in the sense of appeasement or propitiation, there is a note of assuaging an angry God. If we talk of it as rescue, the power from which mankind has to be rescued is not God but the forces at work against God--all the accumulated sins that cripple human freedom.... He sheds his blood with and for us, in our defense, not as a libation to an angry Father.... God initiates [Christ's sacrifice] to conquer sin, not to placate himself.... it is a proof of God's love, not his anger. (115, 121, 122)

And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, "KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS."

What are the tests for entry into the reign or exclusion from it? They are very simple. One will not be asked whether one voted, whether one was a good citizen, or even whether one dealt justly. That is not enough.... The simple test is this. Did you treat everyone, high and low, as if dealing with Jesus himself, with his own inclusive and gratuitous love... "Whenever you did these things to the lowliest of my brothers, you were doing it to me." [This] means that...those who despise the poor are despising Jesus. Those neglecting the homeless are neglecting Jesus. Those persecuting gays are persecuting Jesus.... Our test for entry into heaven's reign is whether we fed Jesus in the hungry, clothed him in the naked, welcomed him in the outcast. (58, 137)

Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.'... For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day. (Matt. 7:21-23, John 6:40)

Who are the Jews of our day? Who are the cursed? Some Christians tell us who. At the funeral of a well-known gay man who died of AIDS, a "Christian" group showed up with placards saying "God hates fags." In the San Diego diocese, a Catholic bishop forbade Christian burial to an openly gay man. Is there any doubt where Jesus would have stood in these episodes--where, in his mystical members, he was standing then? He was with the gay man, not with his haters. This is made all the clearer by the fact that gays are called unclean for the same reason as were other outcasts of Jesus' time--because they violate the Holiness Code of the Book of Leviticus. (32)

[Christ's] own divinity is a divinity in the Father, not apart from him. He will not test the Father, because he is too closely identified with him. It would be putting himself on trial. As he says in John's gospel: "The Son, I tell you the truth, can do nothing but what he sees the Father doing. And whatever he does, the Son does in his turn. For the Father loves the Son, and shows him whatever he does" (Jn 5.19-20). (16-17)

We worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; Neither confounding the Persons; nor dividing the Essence. For there is one Person of the Father; another of the Son; and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one; the Glory equal, the Majesty coeternal.

There must have been some good in the man for Jesus to have chosen him not only to follow him but to be one of the Twelve and the trusted bearer of the common purse (Jn 13.29). Judas is a practical man, who deplores the waste of money on precious oils, but he seems idealistic as well, wanting to save money for the poor (Jn 12.4-5).... Jesus knows that Judas is fulfilling the plan of the Father, which leads to the disgraceful death and burial of both men. He says of his followers in general: "Not one of them is lost but the one marked out to be lost to fulfill the scripture" (Jn 17.12). Judas is involuntarily following the will of the Father, as Jesus does voluntarily. (101)

killed himself for having killed God. It was an act of contrition that redeems him, makes him a kind of comrade for all of us who have betrayed Jesus. He is our patron. Saint Judas.... I believe the Shepherd [Jesus, when He supposedly descended into hell after He died] was first seeking out his special lost one, Judas. (104)