Thursday, 4 September 2014
The crossroads of despair and deliverance....
Matthew 16: 21-28; Mark 8: 27-9:1; Luke 9: 22-27:
Part 1
Matthew 16:
21 From that time on, Jesus began to show
his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the
hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the
third day be raised. 22And
Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, ‘God forbid it, Lord!
This must never happen to you.’ 23But
he turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling-block
to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’
The recognition that Jesus of the Nazareth sermon is
the Messiah by Peter at Caesarea Philippi marks a turning point in the life of
Jesus. Jesus has always been on His way to Jerusalem, His objective and life’s
work has not changed but the disciples are as ready as they ever will be to
hear how all this teaching about radical living culminates. They are ready to hear how Jesus brings about
the irreversible victory of the Kingdom of God over the powers that rage
against them and their creator. Jesus speaks plainly and to the point. He has
to go to Jerusalem and there He will be rejected by the ruling elites and the
fickle crowd; they will kill him but He will rise from the dead. Funny isn’t
it, that we hear only part of the story. Peter is upset, very upset that Jesus
is not fitting into his plans and meeting Peter’s needs Peter’s way. What was
it that Peter heard that caused him so much offence? Was Peter objecting to the
death of Jesus, His resurrection or both? Ah! Peter is in a bit of a dilemma;
he has heard something he does not like or want and this drowns out all the
rest of the story. He hears only the trouble of the story and does not hear the
redemption within it. Peter’s mind is consumed with a view of suffering and
death based on despair while Jesus has just told him about a death and
resurrection that leads to deliverance. Peter hears despair Jesus said
deliverance; Peter’s mind is stuck again in the old way of thinking. Jesus is
announcing the need to think and act in a new way that conquers death and
suffering and brings life. The forces that rage against life do not want Jesus
to go to Jerusalem and on to the cross at Calvary. At the cross the forces that
rage against God and His creation along with their kingdom of oppression, poverty
and violence will be defeated forever and the irreversible shift from death to
life will take place in the death and resurrection of Jesus. At the cross there
will be enough blood spilt to end the need of it, enough violence to end the
need of it, enough oppression to end the need of it and enough of death to end
the need of it. In the resurrection there is enough life giving power so that
none need perish but all come to a radical change of mind resulting in
resurrection life as Peter would one day write (2 Peter 3:8). Will we follow
Jesus to Jerusalem and to the cross? Will we follow Him to the garden tomb?
Will we follow Him to Galilee and meet Him there and participate in the resurrection
from death to life? Will we come to the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ and admit
that we need to change our mind about how we meet our needs and accept the
offer of forgiveness for meeting our needs our own way? Will we come and accept
the gift of life that can never be taken away from us? It’s the most important decision we will ever
make; may we hear all the words of Jesus and not be diverted by the lie that
there is any other way to resurrection life.
Wednesday, 3 September 2014
Ancient places with new opportunities
Matthew 16: 13-20; Mark 8: 27-30; Luke 9: 18-21
Matthew 16: 15-17
15He said
to them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’ 16Simon Peter answered,
‘You are the Messiah, the Son of
the living God.’ 17And Jesus answered
him, ‘Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed
this to you, but my Father in heaven.
The crossroads of decision is the intersection of
the contemporary culture and the biblical story of the revelation of God in
Jesus Christ. It’s the place where we all stand. It’s a place that we may be
aware of or it may be a place we are totally oblivious to; but this is exactly where
we stand. Jesus drew this to the attention of His disciples at a town called
Caesarea Philippi. ‘Who do people say that the Son of Man is?’
asked Jesus (Verse 13). The response is the first arm of the crossroads; it
begins with the request of a response from contemporary culture to the
teachings and practices of Jesus. The answer is always diverse and even
bizarre. ‘But who do you say that I am?’ is
the question directed to disciples; the Christ aware, Holy Spirit informed
and those who are actively finding themselves in the story of Jesus of the
Nazareth sermon. The response by Peter: ‘‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.’’ is the second arm of the crossroads. These two arms intersect at the point of
salvation: that is the point where the hope of the Nazareth Sermon that is the
fulfilment of the prophetic purposes of Christ meet the needs of contemporary
culture. The truth and acknowledgment of Jesus as the Messiah, that is the
fulfilment of the prophetic promises results in a new social order, a Kingdom,
a community called the Church. This is
not just an ordinary flesh and blood community; it is a revelation of the
divine community and their plan and purpose. Jesus and His disciples are in an
ancient place with a new name. Caesarea Philippi was a new name given by a
puppet Herod Philip the Tetrarch in honour of Caesar Augustus. It was the site
of the ancient worship of the pagan god pan. There was a cave nearby associated
with the ancient cult that was thought to be gates of Hades (death). Perhaps it all makes a bit more sense? The
disciples stand at the crossroads of decision; a place of ancient cultic
practices but also a place where Jesus has come to announce the inauguration of
the Kingdom of God. The old sites and their practices are passing away into the
realm of history; the new has come in fulfilment of a promise; it has arrived
and the old ways of death being practiced around them will not stop the
inevitability of the consummation of the Kingdom. The rock on which the
community of disciples and the Kingdom of God is built is on the assurance that
Jesus is the Messiah, the
Son of the living God. Today you and I stand again at the crossroads of
decision. We are in an ancient place surrounded by all sorts of idolatrous
worship and all sorts of competing claims. We can be the intersection of the
teachings and practices of Jesus in our contemporary period if we would
acknowledge and accept Jesus as the Messiah, the
Son of the living God and turn His teachings into our practices.
Tuesday, 2 September 2014
Give us a sign to say yes to change?
Matthew 16:1-12; Mark 8: 11- 21
Mark 8: 11- 13
11 The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, asking
him for a sign from heaven, to test him. 12And he sighed deeply
in his spirit and said, ‘Why does this generation ask for a sign? Truly I tell
you, no sign will be given to this generation.’ 13And he left them, and getting into the boat again, he went
across to the other side.
Jesus of the Nazareth sermon has revealed
Himself as the source of renewal: physically, socially, psychologically and
environmentally. The stories we have considered together demonstrate Jesus as
being concerned with our holistic experience and the impact on our experience
of wellbeing. Jesus, and the Kingdom He inaugurates is concerned with the
personal, communal, the political and the economic circumstances of life. His
birth story, the short encounter with the theologians at the age of twelve, His
baptism and ministry narratives all point to a person engaged with life in its
fullness and entirety. The gospel that Jesus preached was personal and social
both at the same time. It all mattered; it was and is all spiritual. The sigh
of Jesus and the exasperation that it reveals is His frustration with
reductionism, that is reducing the Kingdom He is announcing to one ‘sign’. In
fact this reductionist way of thinking
in our passages today is seen as dangerous and self-destructive In
Mark’s account Jesus states: ‘5And he cautioned them, saying, ‘Watch out—beware of the yeast
of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.’’.
The Pharisees reduced life to religious ritual and separation from the
contamination of the gentiles and especially Rome. The Herod party reduced
everything to the compromise with the powerful elites of the day and were
characterised with their enthusiasm for Hellenisation and cultural syncretism.
Jesus Kingdom is neither a separation nor a compromise; it’s a new and
interdependent way of being in the world based on the ethics of inclusion and
the recognition of the needs of holistic human beings. It is not Greek nor is
it anti Greek; it is the fulfilment of the promise of the Creating, sustaining
and redemptive God. Syrophoenician women are invited to participate as are
centurions, the physically sick, the economically poor, and the hungry; even
some Pharisees who come at night and acknowledge that Jesus is sent from God
(John 3:2) are invited. All of them
state that the signs point to inclusion; we all get the invitation to
participate in the life transforming Kingdom.
The sign that is being asked for by the ruling elite is really a sign
that ‘conforms’ to their authority. They are asking Jesus to ‘confirm’ He and
the Kingdom He is inaugurating is no threat to them. Jesus stated that this is
the need of a whole generation of people; everyone wants their needs confirmed
and met their way; but this is exactly the sign that will NOT be given. It’s time for change; the time to conform is
over; it’s a new age and God is demonstrating it in the works, teachings and
the places where Jesus is journeying. God’s preferential option is in favour
of: the poor, the captives, the blind and the oppressed. Jesus is proclaiming in His words and practices (the only
signs that will be given) ‘the year of the Lord’s favour.’ And as for you and
me, we are at the crossroads of decision again!
Monday, 1 September 2014
Tradition
Matthew 15:1-20; Mark 7: 1-23; John 7:1
Matthew 15: 6
6So, for the sake of your tradition, you make
void the word of God.
As
we have been reflecting upon over the past weeks the words of Jesus and their
practical application to our lives provides the disciple with the holistic
assessment of human need, the explanation of that need, the plan to meet need
and four levels of help required to put the plan of God into practice in our
lives. We have looked at explanations of need and the frustration of need by
considering the Sermon on the Mount and the three part form of the teachings of
Jesus: current situation, present outcome and transformative participation in
the Kingdom inaugurated by Jesus. The
four levels or domains of intervention given by the words and practices of Jesus; the Word of God; can be direct in
practice that is, we hear His word and obey it (the call of the disciples Mark
2: 13-14); we can receive intervention through others for example a disciple
(the call of Phillip and then Nathanael in John 1), intervention in our lives
can be ‘collective’ a form of advocacy ( Feeding Five Thousand Mark 6: 30-44)
and intervention can be instructional (Parables with explanations for disciples
Matthew 13). The Kingdom becomes present
and releases its transformative power through our willing participation on
these four levels. They each represent an interdependent exchange of grace;
through the faith of participative obedience to the words and practices of
Jesus. In our passage today Jesus offers us the opportunity to learn how to
avoid disempowering the Word of God. Avoid tradition! Religious disciples are
just that; the offer discipline in a tradition of religion. This, on the
surface appears to meet our needs but it’s a con, it’s the hand is quicker than
the eye; it’s an appearance that all is well but the outcome is: self-reliance,
pride and legalism. Religion interprets the words of Jesus but does not obey
them. That’s why it’s so dangerous. Religion offers us something else in the
place of obedience to Jesus; it offers ritual. The way we dress, the way speak
with holy jargon, the way we put our money in the collection but not our lives;
the way we defend the unborn child (and so we should) but refuse to speak out against
war and the taking of human life once the child is born and in this world.
Religious ritual is the ultimate addiction of humanity; it offers the perfect
alternative to applying the words of Jesus: there is no need for living with
ordinary people in community, no need to actively and personally read and apply
the scriptures and religious ritual does not want us delving too deep in to the
biblical story and hearing the words and seeing the practices of Jesus up
close. Jesus was not a religious studies lecturer! Jesus taught us that our
religious practices are the problem; we are the real problem and not the
solution; Jesus taught us that our personal assessment of life must start with
our assessment of the ‘Heart’ and the recognition that we are in a state of
desperately meeting of our own needs our own way. Are we ready to give up our
religion for the sake of a transformed life? As a movement there were no more
religious and ritually pure than the ‘Pharisees and Scribes’ but it was from
the teeth out. Jesus offers us a transformed heart, mind, body, relationships
and community; but will we participate with Him in its fulfilment?
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