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an unvarnished Jesus who refuses to be a spokesperson for the assumed cultural values of Americanism is deeply unsettling for many American Christians.
Most of us are scripted to think that life is a game and the purpose of life is to win. This is the way that seems right. But the divine truth is that life is a gift and the purpose of life is to learn to love well.
The truth is that for most of us economic self-interest is the single greatest obstacle to full participation in the kingdom of God. We cannot love our neighbor as our self without being willing to share our wealth.
The glory of the kingdom is Jesus Christ crucified and James and John had unwittingly asked to be crucified with Jesus. This should remind us that the kingdom of Christ does not come in the way of worldly power politics.
We think of love as mere sentiment, while accepting violence as true power. Yet the whole life and ministry of Jesus is a reputation of this lie.
We persuade by love, witness, Spirit, reason, rhetoric, and if need be, by martyrdom, but never by force.
Faith is not a commodity or a currency—it’s not a coin to operate a vending machine. Faith is organic, living, and capable of growth. Faith is like a seed, not a coin.
If our thinking about the kingdom of God is infected with American notions of greatness and bigness, we will inevitably have a deeply distorted Christianity.
In an age where the killing capacity of Cain’s club has been exponentially multiplied by the creation of nuclear arsenals, searching for Noah’s ark on Mount Ararat instead of seeking to rid the world of violence really is an exercise in missing the point!
As Gandhi shrewdly observed, “an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.”
Jesus saves the world by turning exponential revenge into exponential forgiveness.
Christian faith cannot long be sustained as a private opinion held by a lone individual. Christianity is not a solo project.
Why are we so convinced of our own deservedness? Isn’t it just as likely that in the sight of God we are those who though only laboring one hour still need—not deserve, but need—a day’s wage?
A flat reading of the Bible allows us to proof-text any idea we want, but Jesus is the Word of God. So if Moses says to practice capital punishment and stone certain sinners, Jesus says, “Let the one without sin cast the first stone,” and God says, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him!” Or if Elijah calls down fire from heaven to consume the soldiers sent to arrest him, Jesus says, “Love your enemies,” and God says, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him!”
All Scripture is fulfilled in and by Jesus Christ. So if we don’t see it in Jesus, we let it go—because even the Bible must bow to Jesus.
If we read the Bible allowing it to do what it does best by pointing us to Jesus, we are engaging with Scripture properly. But if we read the Bible in search of texts to force Jesus to conform to our ideas about who to hate and how to justify violence, we can expect to be rebuked by the spirit of the living Christ.
Jesus is essentially asking, “What are you going to do if the people whose theology you scorn are more merciful than you? What if the one you’ve made an outsider treats you as a neighbor, what are you going to do then?”
Who is my neighbor? The person I have an opportunity to love, help, and alleviate their suffering.
Peace of mind is not the merited award for strict adherence to duty, but is a state cultivated through contemplative practices centered on Jesus.
Jesus’ teaching on hell is basically this: If you refuse to love, you cannot enter the kingdom of God and will end up a lonely tormented soul.
This is what can happen if we adhere to the seductive adage, “Hate the sin, but love the sinner.” It sounds good, but almost always leads to the tragedy of the Pharisees. Jesus’ parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector teaches us to love the sinner and hate our own sin.
It’s also significant to understand that the term “sinners” in the Gospels is not referring merely to those who sin, but to those who had been formally excluded from Jewish religious life because of particular sins, and at the top of that list were the colluding, cheating tax collectors.
Similar to those who are currently excluded from Christian religious life because of particular sins: homosexuality at the very top of the list.
The scandal was that Jesus was willing to dine with excluded tax collectors and expelled sinners before they repented.
Jesus dined with both Pharisees and tax collectors. Jesus was willing to share a table with tax collectors despite their sins of dishonesty and extortion, and Jesus was willing to share a table with Pharisees despite their sins of self-righteousness and pride.
Such is the transformative power of the unconditional love that animated the ministry of Jesus! What a thousand sermons from a hundred Pharisees could never accomplish, Jesus accomplished by simply sharing a meal with the most despised man in town.
there is no way to peace…peace is the way.
Jesus exorcises the mob spirit by saying, “Let the one among you all who is without sin cast the first stone.” And with that brilliant sentence the demonic spell was broken. They could no longer act in satanic unison, but had to act as self-reflective individuals responsible for their own actions.
Suddenly, i have to deal with my own plank before i worry about your speck.
He doesn’t come to steal, but to serve the flock. He doesn’t come to kill, but to lay down his life for the sheep. He doesn’t come to destroy, but to bring abundant life.
But if it’s a voice that cherishes the memory of colonialism (stealing), or endorses war because God is on our side (killing), or incites hostility toward vilified scapegoats (destruction), you can be sure it’s not a voice that comes from the Good Shepherd, and is not a voice Christians should follow.
John concludes his record of the ministry of Jesus, before moving into his Passion narrative, with Jesus’ seventh and greatest sign—the raising of a man who was four days dead. This last sign points us to Jesus as the one who saves us from all that would destroy us, including our ultimate enemy, death itself.
The raising of Lazarus is given to us as a sign conveying that no one is beyond the saving reach of Jesus Christ. No matter how dead we are in our sins, Jesus is the one who has the power to recall us back to life.
LENT Day 25 (Saturday) Mark 14:43–46 2nd Station of the Cross: Jesus Is Betrayed and Arrested We all know that Jesus was betrayed by a kiss. But why did Judas do it? Why did he betray Jesus? Was it for the money? It’s true Judas was a thief—the treasurer who was also an embezzler. Nevertheless, Judas was more complicated than a petty thief who betrays his rabbi for thirty coins. Judas’ story gets complicated when he betrays Jesus with a kiss. Why the kiss? Why this theatrical embellishment? If Judas is betraying Jesus for money, why not just point him out—that’s the guy!—take the money and
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This parable brims with theological significance as Jesus shows us that the heart of the Father contains no wrath toward sinners, but overflows with gratuitous love.
The only wrath we find in the parable belongs to the Pharisee-like older brother, not the God-like father.
