Mark, A Meal, A Leper & The Kingdom Of God (part 3)

As Mark is written within the confines of the early church that found itself immersed within much knowledge of the historical Jesus, along with resounding and powerful traditions about Him that would clearly have weighed heavily upon them in the area of practice, it is right to call attention to the marked contrast between what can be observed here in Mark and what one finds presented in a situation in the Gospel of John (which is also written during a time and within a community steeped in first-hand knowledge of Jesus). 

In John, after Jesus’ arrest and initial questioning by Annas and Caiaphas, “they brought Jesus from Caiaphas to the Roman governor’s residence” (John 18:28a).  The author then reports that “They did not go into the governor’s residence” (18:28c).  Why did they not go in?  It was “so they would not be ceremonially defiled, but could eat the Passover meal” (18:28d).  A stark contrast indeed.  In Mark, Jesus dines with a leper, sitting on his furniture and sharing a table with him in complete disregard of established custom, clearly communicating truths about the kingdom of the Creator God and about the nature of His own rule of that kingdom through what He was knowingly and consciously doing. 

When these two accounts of Jesus’ life and ministry include such stories, both are making points that are not easily dismissed.  One account represents separation and exclusion, whereas the other highlights inclusion --- pointing to a highly necessary aspect of ecclesiology.  John’s account of a concern to not become ritually impure before the commencement of Passover is useful because it points up the high level of seriousness with which such things were taken at the time.  For the sake of rabbinic credibility, and especially that of a rabbi that carried and stoked messianic expectations, issues of impurity would have been a concern. 

With no real record of time, and no textual sense of time between His certain contracting of ceremonial impurity while at this house and the celebration of Passover with His disciples, it would appear to His fellow members of the house of Israel that Jesus has, in fact, presided over a Passover (His last supper) celebration while he found Himself in a state of impurity.  With what one must presume is a well-founded grasp of this information, Mark demonstrates a complete lack of concern in this area, and instead presents this picture of Jesus that is stocked with a great deal of implications for those, both inside and outside of ethnic and national Israel, who call or will come to call Him Lord. 

There are other quite significant points to be made.  One of those points has to do with the fact that Jesus has chosen to dine in this particular house.  Calling upon the Gospel of John for assistance, one is reminded that Bethany is the place of Lazarus’ residence.  In chapter twelve of John, it appears that the reader is presented with a story (unless there was another story about Jesus being anointed with costly oil, the action being criticized as wasteful, and Jesus criticizing the criticizers and commending the “waste”) that is based upon the same meal as that which is reported in the fourteenth chapter of Mark. 

Love On John's Terms (part 11)

It is then appropriate to take a look at the uses of “miraculous signs.”  In the second chapter of John, this term is used in conjunction with the changing of the water into wine, as the author writes that “Jesus did this as the first of His miraculous signs” (2:11a).  This was said to have been a way in which “He revealed His glory, and His disciples believed in Him” (2:11b).  Consequently then, the presentation of the signs are often linked to the issue of belief. 

In the twenty-third verse of the same chapter, the author reports that “while Jesus was in Jerusalem at the feast of the Passover, many people believed in His name because they saw the miraculous signs He was doing.”  Interestingly, this mention of miraculous signs is not specifically connected to any particular account of the performance of miraculous signs.  It is simply an assertion on the part of the author that seems to rely on the knowledge of the miraculous as part of the Jesus tradition in the community for which this Gospel was composed. 

At this point in the record offered by the author of John, all that Jesus is said to have done in Jerusalem was the driving out of those changing money and selling animals (2:15), along with making a statement about the Temple being His Father’s house (2:16).  These would hardly be defined as “miraculous signs” in any respect.  In response to His activity in the Temple, unsurprisingly, Jesus is questioned by the Jewish leaders, with a demand to know why, and under what authority, He had done what He had done.  In fact, as it relates to the purposes of this study at this point, it is even asked of him “What sign can you show us, since you are doing these things?” (2:18b)  Here, the use of “miraculous” is not offered.  Jesus is said to have responded to the query with the highly subversive and quite obviously proleptic “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up again” (2:19), but there is certainly nothing in this story that approaches the level of “miraculous sign”. 

From there, John immediately moves to the story of an encounter between Jesus and a Jewish leader named Nicodemus.  With no chapter breaks in the original composition, and with it most likely designed to be delivered as an oral performance at a single setting, the listener is taken directly from Jesus speaking to a group of Jewish leaders, to Jesus speaking with one Jewish leader.  Presumably then, it is reasonable to understand Nicodemus as coming to Jesus as a direct result of what took place in the Temple.  It is probable then, for the purpose of this Gospel and its author, that the listener is supposed to presume that Nicodemus was himself present at the event in the Temple and heard what Jesus said. 

In his opening statement to Jesus, Nicodemus says “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God.  For no one could perform the miraculous signs that you do unless God is with Him” (3:2b).  Once again, this talk of “miraculous signs” presumes a shared knowledge within the Johannine community, for there is nothing in the Jerusalem-situated narrative, to that point, that could truly be labeled as such. 

Jesus’ response to Nicodemus contains the first reported use, in the Gospel of John, of the all-important phrase “kingdom of God.”  Jesus said to Him, “I tell you the solemn truth, unless a person is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (3:3).  This will go on to tie in quite well with Jesus’ talk, within the same conversation, of perishing and eternal life (which, as has already been established, is linked to conceptions of exile and exodus, both of which speak to the nature of the rule of the Creator God over His people, and through them, the whole of creation), and of the salvation and redemption of the world that is part of the Creator’s design and purpose for the Christ.  Naturally, Jesus then goes on to speak about the need for belief (3:12,16,18), thus relating Nicodemus’ use of “miraculous signs” with belief. 

Love On John's Terms (part 6)

Why mention the Temple here and in connection with John’s conception of love?  It has to be mentioned because the presence of the Creator God among His covenant people, with Jesus understood to be serving as the Temple (especially in the light of the fact that at the time of these writings the Temple of Jerusalem no longer existed), signaled the end of exile.  The Creator God’s presence meant that exodus was at hand and that the new age of His rule on earth had begun. 

The Creator God’s personal presence in the Temple was the sign that Israel was free from its oppressors.  A new and glorious Temple (“the glory of the one and only, full of grace and truth---John 1:14b) would cause a hearer or reader to hearken back to the construction of the first Temple, under the reign of Solomon, when Israel’s glory was believed to have reached its full height and extent, and all nations came streaming to Israel and to Solomon, paying homage and tribute.  This could be understood to be a component of the Isaianic vision of the messianic banquet (shared by Luke and seemingly embraced by Jesus Himself), which itself was a marker of the Creator God’s love for the whole of His creation. 

This could also call attention to what is to be found in Ezra and the story of the establishment of the second Temple, in that those that had seen the glory of the first Temple wept.  If this situation of glory in relation to the Temple was again in effect (and the language suggests such thoughts), then the messianic age---the kingdom age---had dawned in and with Jesus.  Consequently, the remainder of the narrative, including the notion of the love modeled by Jesus, which was to be meted out to and in and for the world by Jesus’ disciples, must be heard as echoes of that fact.  Jesus’ words and actions can then be understood within that context, as they serve to reveal the love of the Creator God while providing the model for love for one another that will be what marks out the fact of the presence of the kingdom of the Creator God on earth that was inaugurated commensurate with all that was included in the life and mission of the One understood as the incarnated Word. 

In light of all of this, it will be the concrete activities of Jesus, as reported within John, that identify what is to be the lived-out love of the Christian community.  Therefore, the first instance of Jesus’ activity, apart from Him coming to be baptized at the hands of His forerunner, is the call to follow Him.  Surely, the greatest example of love to be expressed between the Christ’s disciples is the ongoing encouragement to follow Jesus and submit to Him as the Lord of all.  Of course, the idea of what it means to follow Jesus (and therefore love in the way that He loves---which is the way that God loves) must be rounded out and given its full orb through the procession of the presentation of His life, which is precisely the path of John’s narrative. 

Jesus first calls men to follow Him in the very the first chapter of John, as He answers a question posed to Him by two of John the Baptist’s disciples in regards to where He was lodging with a simple “Come and you will see” (1:39a).  In the forty-third verse, Jesus speaks to Philip and says “Follow me.”  These disciples will go on to learn about what it will mean to follow Him, as He reveals to them the kingdom of His God through His own proximate functioning as the Temple, which will also be the experience of those that hear or read this Gospel record.  To that end, the first chapter of John closes with Him telling these newly minted disciples: “I tell all of you the solemn truth---you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man” (1:51). 

These words, with the use of “Son of Man” language, are likely designed to evidence messianic and therefore kingdom of Creator God sensibilities while building on the Temple language previously used, while also causing the informed hearer to think of Genesis and “Jacob’s ladder.”  In that story, following the vision of his dream in which angels were going up and down on the ladder or stairway (depending on the translation), Jacob exclaimed, among other things, that “This is nothing else than the house of God” (28:17b), thus prompting him to name the place “Bethel” (house of God).  By using these words, the author makes clear the fact that Jesus is presenting Himself as the Temple (Bethel – the house of God), thus defining Himself to these would-be disciples as the locus of the Creator God’s activity and as the ordering principle of the life of the covenant people.  All of this serves to prepare for seeing Jesus as the Creator God in the flesh, and by extension, the outworking of the love of the Creator God that is to be the model for living life in the way of Jesus.        

Proclaim The Lord's Death (part 1)

For every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes. – 1 Corinthians 11:26  (NET)

Here in the first letter to the Corinthians is what appears to be the very first, surviving, written record of the what has come to be referred to as the Christian practice of communion.  Though it was undoubtedly something that took place as part of a communal meal---as it refers to actions instituted by Jesus that took place at a meal, for the majority of modern believers, it exists primarily as a ceremony involving the bread and the cup, minus a meal. 

Even though the element of the community meal has been largely lost by the church, the communion demands to be understood within the context of the Passover, stretching the hearts and minds of its participants all the way back to the time of Israel’s Egyptian exodus.  Thus it serves to remind those that partake of the elements of the extraordinary, intervening power of the Creator God, and of His actions undertaken on behalf of His covenant people. 

Surely, the Christ-event was and should be thought of along such lines.  In addition to that, owing to what came to be understood as Jesus’ messianic presentation of Himself, as He did and as He taught (to borrow a sensibility from the opening of the Acts), the communion itself, when it is reduced to simply the bread and the cup, becomes a microcosm of the messianic banquet, which Jesus Himself was likely to have been consciously enacting every time He situated Himself at a meal.  The messianic banquet signaled, among other things, that the Creator God’s rule on earth had been established.  When Jesus joined a meal, and especially when He offered teaching and parables that had the kingdom of the Creator God as its subject, this also should be taken as a signal that said kingdom had come in and through Him, and that a new age had dawned---eclipsing the old age as the Creator God had begun reconciling all things to Himself through the presence of His Christ. 

As one considers the message that surrounds the Apostle Paul’s presentation of the Lord’s Supper, as he mentions his having received from the Lord what he had already passed on to this church community prior to the occasion of the writing of this letter, it is curious that he concludes his recollection with the insistence and directive that “every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.”  It should be noticed that Paul makes no explicit mention of the Resurrection. 

Though there are Passover and messianic banquet sensibilities at play, along with all that is implied by those things, and though it is obvious that a resurrected Christ is implied in the phrase “until He comes,” Paul seems to restrict the proclamation of the communion to an invocation of the Lord’s death.  By focusing on the Lord’s death, quite naturally, there is a focus on the cross---on crucifixion.  It seems to, at least at this point as Paul writes to this particular community and as an attempt is made by an observer to be situated alongside this community so as to be able to hear the voice of the Spirit of the Creator God that was presumed to be at work through the Apostle, elevate the cross of the Christ to a position of primacy in relation to the Christian meal table and its celebration of communion. 

Though at first glance this seems a bit odd, especially when one considers Paul’s overt pre-occupation with the Resurrection and its implications (not to mention the great dissertation of the Resurrection that will shortly be heard by the recipients of his letter).  However, when observing the structure of the letter that Paul has provided to this point, there is a realization that this focus is not odd in the least.  In the first chapter of the letter, the Apostle writes “Paul wasn’t crucified for you, was he?” (1:13b), along with “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the Gospel, so that the cross of Christ would not become useless” (1:17).  Shortly thereafter, he adds that “we preach about a crucified Christ” (1:23a).  This letter kicks off and would appear to be premised by the message of the cross.  

Hated (part 6 of 7)

Even before the Mosaic covenant that came to Israel at Sinai, what had been Israel’s responsibility?  According to the Abrahamic covenant, it was to be a light to all peoples that they might reveal the glory of their covenant God, which would be done through the demonstration of divine blessings that would come from their living as their God’s covenant people---exemplifying divine blessing.  After the exodus, they would show forth this covenant by keeping their God’s Sabbaths, reverencing His sanctuary, and by not worshiping idols.  Through this, their God would show Himself, through Israel, as the Lord of all creation. 

This could engender hate in two ways, and this entails a shift from history to philosophy, attempting to make an appropriate application of these words.  The first way that could engender hate would be based on the fact that humanity, beginning with Adam, has been rebellious, not wanting to submit to its Creator God, and certainly not wanting to have their self-erected gods dismissed.  Therefore hate is directed towards those that reveal a God that rules over all and demands (deserves?) unswerving allegiance. 

The second potential reason for being hated is their presentation of themselves as the Creator God’s chosen people, through covenant, and then not living in a way that reflected that idea and which did not honor the blessing---by engaging in idolatry or by turning inward so as to keep their God’s blessing only for themselves and excluding those that they felt were unworthy of the covenant.  The second reason is quite compelling.  Can this be applied to the words that Jesus directed towards His disciples, which His disciples would in turn purposefully direct towards His church?  Perhaps. 

What is a fundamental obligation of the person that claims to be in Christ?  Is it to judge people, to regulate their lives, and tell them how to live?  No.  A thousand times no!  Unfortunately, this is what usually generates hatred.  However, is hatred that stems from doing that which Jesus has not obligated His followers to do, really the hatred of which Jesus speaks?  Probably not.  Beyond that, are people going to hate believers, or would they have so fiercely hated and persecuted the early followers of Jesus if all they spoke about was escaping off to a heavenly island of peace and bliss following death?  Again, probably not. 

So why would there be hate?  Well, as it was for Israel, so it would be for the new covenant people of the Christ’s church, as such people went and go about the business of their primary obligation to proclaim that Jesus is the Lord of all, and that all are subject to Him and to His rule, without exception.  Quite naturally, this can produce hatred, as it attacks the root of what seems to be mankind’s primary problem, which is the misuse of the divine image, as that divine image bearing is turned into self-worship and a thirst for power rather than being exercised in the reflection of the Creator God’s glory into His world. 

According To His Own Image (part 2 of 2)

Eve had been told that if she ate the fruit of the tree of which her and Adam had been commanded not to eat, that she would become like a divine being (Genesis 3:5).  Interestingly and with the words of the serpent in mind, it is to be noted that the very first words to be heard from human lips following the expulsion from the garden were “I have created a man just as the Lord did” (4:1b). 

Prior to reading about Adam fathering a son in his own likeness and according to his own image, one finds that “When God created humankind, He made them in the likeness of God.  He created them male and female; when they were created, He blessed them and named them ‘humankind’.” (5:1b)  This is quite the contrast to that which would come to be said of Adam.  The Creator God created humankind in His likeness and image, but Adam was said to have fathered a son in his own likeness and image.  Quite the contrast indeed. 

The being that is the first to be called the son of God (Adam - Luke 3:38), was fathered in and as the image of the Creator God.  He was reported to have been given dominion and rule.  He was given “every seed-bearing plant on the face of the entire earth and every tree that has seed in it” (1:29b).  The Creator said to His image-bearers that “They will be yours for food” (1:29c).  With what is an obviously very careful choice of language, as it is uttered against the backdrop of the cosmic creation mythology, it is said of the first being to be fathered by humankind, that he was fathered in his father’s (Adam) image. 

Unfortunately, due to what is put forth as a faithless rebellion against their God’s command, the dominion and rule had been forfeited.  This son would be told, in stark contrast to that which was first told to his father, that “cursed is the ground… in painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.  It will produce thorns and thistles for you, but you will eat the grain of the field.  By the sweat of your brow you will eat food until you return to the ground” (3:17b-19a). 

So it is to this day.  As the Scripture says: “This is the record of the family line of Adam” (5:1a), as generation after generation come into being and pass away, all fathered in the image and likeness of Adam.  Though today’s generations live within a world in which the kingdom of God has been established, and in which Jesus (the second Adam-Romans 5), Who is the Son of God that is the representation of God’s essence (Hebrews 1:3) and the image of the invisible God that is the firstborn over all creation (Colossians 1:15), Who has rule and dominion because of His death and death-conquering Resurrection through which God began to set His creation to rights, all still struggle with the cursing effect of the fall, in the inaugurated but not yet consummated kingdom of God.