There is a second feature of the historical Jesus that can significantly inform the life of the church today: his relationship to the society of his time. He was deeply involved in the historical life of his own people. Specifically, he saw them headed on a course toward historic catastrophe flowing out of their loyalties and blindness; he called his hearers to a radically different understanding of what faithfulness to God meant, an understanding that was to be embodied in the life of a community in history.
