Why Two Testaments?

Why do Christians have the Old Testament?  The Muslims certainly knew both testaments of our Bible and they kept neither but started over.  The Jewish holy texts remain our holy texts because the disciples read for and found Jesus there, so the Hebrew Scriptures become the first volume of a two volume revelation. After the resurrection his followers finally realized that what they wanted they were not getting, however, what they got was better.

ImageThat was not clear at first because they were looking for David, a type of Hercules or Alexander the Great, to thump the wicked, restoring Israel to her place in the sun.  I’ve always found it interesting that on the way to Emmaus after joining the party, Jesus opened the Scriptures showing how Messiah had to suffer and die. (I wish Cleopas had published his notes).

What he explained on the road, was that what they believed about Messiah was indeed true but incomplete and that the triumph of Messiah was at the end of the age not then.  Their desperate need threw off their timing.   What are we desperate for today?  Is it possible that what we want is less than God wants for us?  Remember that Columbus was on his way to the Orient when he bumped into the Occident.  What Columbus accidentally found was better than what he looked for!

O Lord, we are not yet as we shall be and after the dying of our illusions lies the resurrection of our true selves.   Don’t forget the promise of Columbus.  Amen.

I Will Fall Upon the Rock

tenants_in_vineyardOne of the strangest and to my mind most disturbing sayings of Jesus is in Matthew’s Gospel 21:44.  It occurs after a parable of conflict with the Jewish religious establishment.  Jesus said, “The very stone with the builders rejected has become the head of the corner?  Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces; but when it falls on anyone it will crush them.”  What does this mean?

I can’t be certain of all it means but I believe that these remarks of Jesus point to the root of the conflict between Jesus and the Jewish religious community especially the Pharisees.  This is also the issue between Paul and his Jewish opponents. It is a sort of which came first the chicken or egg question. According to Jesus and Paul it was the gift of God’s presence that made a good life possible rather than if you live a good life God will be present as a reward for your goodness. The challenge of Jesus was this: obedience does not lead to God, rather God’s love leads to obedience. This is the reverse of what was happening in 1st Century Judaism.  Christianity is not immune from the tendency to think we should or could EARN God’s love.

The deepest longing of the Jewish people was for the Messiah to come and bring the Kingdom of God.  The Pharisees who have a bad reputation among Christians were really a renewal movement among Jews.  They longed for the Kingdom and Messiah.  Further they were proactive and decided to do their part to make it happen.  They believed that if everyone followed the law that Messiah would come.  They pushed not just the 10 commandments, but all the rules and interpretation of the law. TAKE IT FURTHER!

Jesus is the rock

They wanted the ritual purity of the priests in the temple – to be normative for all Jews in all parts of their lives.  They were deeply motivated to keep the law and hostile to those not so  inspired because the laxness of some prevented the coming of Messiah. Now Jesus tells them that they had it all wrong.  Being good and getting your ticket punched will not bring God’s presence; rather God’s presence enables goodness.  Keeping all the laws won’t bring Messiah – Messiah will come when he chooses and furthermore here he is: the stone, which the builders rejected, has become the keystone of the arch.

The Jews have a saying: “If a jar falls on a rock, woe be to the jar. If a rock falls on a jar, woe be to the jar. Either way, woe be to the jar!”

God will being in his reign of peace, the Kingdom in his way, on his terms, not because we hold our mouths just so and wish real hard, keeping all the rules and getting our tickets punched.  When the Pharisees and others thought keeping the law would produce God’s presence they were forgetting their own history.

  1. Abraham didn’t go to Canaan looking for God. God lead him there.
  2. Jacob fled his home to escape his brother Esau, whose blessing he had stolen.  As he slept God came looking for him so that Jacob awoke and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place and I did not know it.”
  3.  Moses did not set fire to the bush – the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob came looking for him
  4.  The prophet Isaiah reminds the children of Israel (and us) that it is God that makes a way in the sea, who does a NEW THING, waters in the wilderness, rivers in the desert.
  5. Paul writes in his letter to the Christians in Philippi that he presses on to reach the goal of participating in the resurrection of Christ from the dead.  “…but I press on to make my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own.”
  6. In the reading from Matthew, Jesus tells the story of the wicked tenants, who refused to recognize the heir of the vineyard’s owner when he came to receive what, belonged to the owner.  The vineyard was a common symbol of Israel.  The scribes and chief priests understood the story as a critique of their leadership of Israel.

The irony is that Messiah had come.  The very one that their hearts most longed for had come and they didn’t recognize him because he had not come on their terms [they weren’t good enough yet] but on his father’s terms.  That’s really tragic.

It’s sort of like the old couple who began dating after their spouses died.  They spent a lot of time together and one day as they sat on the porch he leaned over and whispered, “Let’s get married.”  She laughed and said, “It’s a great idea but who would have us?”

Trustees Office at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky

We will encounter the rock, the stone rejected by the builders, whether we recognize him or not.  We will finally encounter the reality that we can’t make it on our own.  We may live in denial and avoid it for as long as humanly possible but eventually the jar and the rock will collide. Most of us talk about grace but we really prefer to earn our way.  We believe that our goodness brings God’s presence when God’s presence brings whatever goodness we display.  Salvation finally is a gift, if we are to be saved.  I at no other time at death we will finally admit/submit to power beyond us – the jar and the rock will collide.  Fortunately that reality is a God who is generous and wants the best for us.  We do not have to wait to the end.  We can choose to embrace the reality that God’s presence is a gift now!  “If you fall on the stone you will be broken to pieces but if the stone falls on anyone it crush them.”  I submit that it is better for God to pick up the pieces of our ego and rework them than to be pulverized.  We can cooperate with our salvation or we can resist it.  It is up to us.

The Shakers have a hymn that sums this up,“I will bow and be simple, I will bow and be free, I will bow and be humble (bow like the willow tree).  I will bow this is the token I will wear the easy yoke.  I will bow and be broken, Yea, I’ll fall upon the rock!”

Let us then fall upon the rock – For indeed – brothers and sister it is the rock of our salvation.      Amen.

 

 

 

 

Our God Makes Leaders Out Of Cowards And Elders Of The Deceitful

Recently I found a new title on Dove Booksellers, “Forsaken Firstborn” a study of how God seems to choose the “wrong” one rather than the one that should be the heir. We find this pattern in the Old Testament. God chooses Isaac over Ishmael. Jacob is chosen over Esau, his twin, even thought he is a stinker. Judah is chosen over his older brothers to be the father of the principal tribe of Israel. Joseph is chosen over his older brothers to be the one to deliver his family even though his brothers reject him. Jacob then blesses the younger of Joseph’s sons to be the chosen son.

Jacob Blessing his Grandsons - C V Vos

Jacob Blessing his Grandsons – C V Vos

As an oldest son I hope that senior birth order is not always the source of perdition and divine rejection. However this does seem to point to the spontaneous, creative and even, if I may say, playful nature of God who makes leaders out of cowards and elders of the deceitful. It gives me hope. Then a thought seized me that I had never thought before. Jesus, the first born, the beloved, was abandoned on the cross. Here the divine pattern is played out in a cosmic way. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me.” is the cry not just of Jesus but also of all the forsaken firstborn.

We are the descendents of Adam the firstborn yea even the forsaken firstborn alienated by sin. Jesus became for the forsaken firstborn. If that were the end of the story it would be a tragedy. But it is not the end of the tale. Jesus is not the forsaken firstborn he is the firstborn of those that sleep. His resurrection is for the forsaken firstborns and all those who have wasted their inheritance (and we all have) in the far country. The good news is that like Jacob the heel grabber who was reconciled with his forsaken older brother Esau, we too are reconciled by the death of Jesus who died as the forsaken firstborn, risen from the dead that we too might not be forsaken but have not only life in the age to come but life and that life full in this present time. Praise be to God who gives us the victory.