THE SHORTEST SHORT INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW TESTAMENT

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HOMECOMINGS

Homecomings conjure up positive images for a lot of people, especially these days as school graduations draw near. For many, homecoming is almost synonymous with reunion--especially alumni.

We touch. We hug. We play. We talk. We sing. We dance. We eat. We do all this and more--together. This is the homecoming, the reunion most of us picture.

But Sunday's Lukan lection on Jesus's homecoming paints a different picture. In Luke's version of Jesus's return to Nazareth, his townmates tried to throw him off a cliff. They found his interpretation of good news to the poor offensive because for Jesus, the poor whom God cared for included those who were not Israelites nor Judahites.

To this day, the bastard from Nazareth who lived his life with and for those whose only hope was God, who challenged the rich to sell everything they have and give the proceeds to the destitute, who defied empire and its life-negating systems, and who commanded everyone who followed him to offer one's life for a friend, remains a very hard sell.

Trump and his ilk will have major problems with this Nazarene troublemaker and his gospel.

*art. "Brow of the Hill near Nazareth" by James Tissot (1836-1902), available at the Vanderbilt Divinity Library digital archives.

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US, THEM, AND ALL OF US

The pronoun “us” assumes belongingness; being a part of a whole. In particular, “us” are insiders. As far as the people of Nazareth were concerned, Jesus was “one of us.” Isaiah was “one of us.” The promises from Scripture was “for us.” Jesus’s proclamation of said promises fulfilled in their hearing was also “for us.” Ultimately, all these presuppose that God is always and only “for us.”

“Us” also presumes another group. Those that do not belong: them. The outsiders. The empire--built on privilege, power, possession and commodification--divides and conquers peoples. The empire creates “us” and “them.” Sunday's lection from Luke 4 presents both groups and posits an alternative.

Jesus proclaims the alternative to the Kingdom of Caesar. In the Kingdom of God, there is no "us", there is no "them"; there is only "all of us". 

At first, those who listened to Jesus read Isaiah were happy. Then, as they listened to him interpret the challenge of the Jubilee, they metamorphosed into a mob bent on throwing him off a cliff! Why? Because Jesus dared to change the beneficiaries of God’s jubilee: Leviticus 25, the year of the Lord’s favor, proclaimed land, liberty and cancellation of all debts. Jubilee meant gospel to those whose only hope is God, good news to a people suffering under Roman occupation. Jesus challenged their interpretation of “us” to include “them.”

For Jesus, there is only “all of us.” If God is our parent, then we, all of us, are God’s children. We are all sisters and brothers. Not just his fellow Nazarenes. Not just his fellow Galileans. Not just his fellow Israelites. 

During the time of Elijah, when drought and famine ravished the land, there were many widows in Israel, yet God sent Elijah to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha, yet none of them were cleansed except Naaman the Syrian. For Jesus, God’s children include the widow at Zarephath in Sidon and Naaman the Syrian.

For Jesus, the poor, the captives, the blind, the oppressed and everyone waiting for the year of the Lord’s favor were not just “us” Israelites but also “them,” the Gentiles, who were poor, captives, blind, oppressed and everyone waiting for the year of the Lord’s favor. 

Thus, the jubilee, then and now, is not just for “us” but also for “them,” and therefore for “all of us.”

*art, "The Poor invited to the Feast," JESUS MAFA 1973 (from the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives).

IN MEMORY OF ONESIMUS: READING PHILEMON INSIDE A JEEPNEY

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THE WEDDING AT CANA

New Testament scholars--among them Rudolf Bultmann, Raymond Brown, and several members of the Jesus Seminar--have argued for a hypothetical "Signs [Semeia] Gospel" or tradition that is embedded in the Gospel of John.

There are no miracles in the gospel. Instead, there are seven signs which scholars say resonate with the seven days of creation in Genesis 1. The Gospel is expicit on which one is the first sign: the creation of wine from water during the wedding at Cana.

Yes, my friends, God has not stopped creating. Aside from creating wine from water, what else was created during the wedding at Cana?

The water put in those half-dozen 20-30 gallon stone jars were for purification and cleansing purposes. That water was not for drinking--it was to be expelled in the ritual process.

Jesus did not simply create wine from water; he created wine for drinking--for taking in--from water supposed to be thrown out.

In doing so, he created a new community that privileges servants over masters. The servants were the first to experience the sign, then the chief steward, and then the bridegroom.

The servants, who toiled yet did not even get to eat during feasts and weddings, were the first recipients of the best wine.

Finally, the creation of wine from water births a discipleship of the unnamed. Many times we forget that the most dedicated disciples of Jesus in the Gospel of John were unnamed: the child with five barley loaves and two fish; the Samaritan woman at the well; the Beloved Disciple; and Jesus's mother.

Many times we forget the role of Jesus's mother in this creation narrative. Many times we forget that the most dedicated disciples that God works through as God continues to create are people who remain unnamed, unrecognized, and uncelebrated.

We easily forget. God does not.

God always remembers.

*art, "The Wedding At Cana," (JESUS MAFA, 1973) available at the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives.

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CROSSING THE JORDAN AND TAKING SIDES

We know what we are supposed to do: help change the world. But before we even think of changing the world, we need the world to change us.

Thus, integration with communities--immersion into different ways of life--is a prerequisite. The late Fr. Carlos Abesamis, in conversation, said that having the Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other is not enough. Newspapers will never be a substitute for immersion, nor will television, radio, or social media.

Immersion transforms people! Immersion has done so for many of us! In the fullness of time, even God went on Immersion. We call it incarnation. Immersion changed God.

Sunday's lection reminds us that one of the most powerful images of immersion in the Bible is baptism. Baptism is about taking sides. When John baptized people in the Jordan, they crossed from one bank to the other, from one side to the other side. They re-enacted the crossing of the Jordan.

It is about doing what Ernesto "Che" Guevarra did: swimming from one bank to the other bank of the Amazon River, knowingly putting himself at risk of a deadly asthma attack and drowning, yet choosing the side of those whose only hope was God.

Baptism is crossing the Jordan: choosing justice and taking possession of liberty, land, and fullness of life that God wants for all people, especially for occupied peoples. Crossing the Jordan can lead to death. John the Baptist crossed the Jordan and was executed by Herod. Jesus crossed the Jordan and was crucified by the Romans.

And you and I are called by our baptism to cross "Rivers of Jordan" wherever we are. Every moment of our lives, we need to choose justice. May we have the courage to do as John and Jesus did.

Choose justice. Always justice.


*art, "John baptizing Jesus," Mural at the Church of Enda Yesus, Axum, Ethiopia (image available at the vanderbilt divinity library digital archives).

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GOD IS ONE OF US

 

The Canonical Gospels begin their narratives in different ways. Mark begins with an adult Jesus who is baptized by John in the Jordan. Matthew has a birth narrative that features Magi who spent about two years searching for the child. Jesus was already a toddler when they reach Bethlehem. Luke's has shepherds who visit Jesus as a baby lying in a manger. John's origin story, which is Sunday's lection, begins in "The Beginning."

Incidentally, a lot of people who memorize Bible verses know John 1.1 (with Genesis 1.1 and, almost everyone's favorite, John 3.16). The Word became Flesh and lived among us. God has stopped watching from a distance.

Stories of Gods taking on human form abound in many of the world's mythologies. Many of the heroes of ancient peoples were demigods or super humans. For the Gospel of John, when the Word became Flesh, the Word was totally and fully Flesh. In other words, God was not Superman disguised as Clark Kent. God was Clark Kent.

For the Gospel of John, God Incarnate gets tired and thirsty; eats and drinks with family and friends; experiences love and loss, and cries, like all of us. God Incarnate takes the side of the poor, feeds the multitudes, experiences betrayal, and suffers torture and crucifixion by empire. Like many among us.

God bleeds. God dies. God is one of us.

My Friends, to believe in the incarnation is to embody justice, accompaniment, solidarity, and life-giving, like Jesus did. The incarnation required a warm body: Jesus’s. The incarnation still requires warm bodies: yours and mine.


*"Christ Child" by Mike Chapman (relief sculpture at Westminster, London), photograh by Diane Brennan. Vanderbilt Divinity Library image collection.