Simply Christian - Thoughts on Jesus

Jesus: Rescue and Renewal (part 1)
Jesus had gone about Palestine announcing that now, at last, God’s kingdom was arriving. The message that the ancient prophecies were coming true, that Israel’s story was reaching its destination at last, that God himself was on the move once more and was about to rescue his people and put the world to rights.

The messiah was thought to be YHWH’s anointed, the king in waiting. Those who were expecting a messiah were expecting him to fight the battle against Israel’s enemies – specifically, the Romans. He would rebuild, or at least cleanse and restore, the Temple. He would bring Israel’s long history to its climax, reestablishing the monarchy as in the days of David and Solomon. He would be God’s representative to Israel, and Israel’s representative to God. We see someone who tried to mold himself into this exact image in the person of Simeon ben Kosiba. Central to his aim was to rebuild the temple and thereby place himself in the long line: David, Solomon, Hezekiah, Josiah, Judas Maccabeus, Herod…all kings of the Jews, all Temple builders or temple restorers. For that to happen, he would have to fight the ultimate battle against the pagan forces.

So, why did Jesus’ followers hail him as Messiah? He had led no military uprising, nor did it look as though he would do so. He did not always act like this kind of messiah, but did point to various signs that he was some kind of messiah (even pointing out that John was the Elijah to come who would pave the way for the messiah). But nobody in this period supposed that that Messiah would have to suffer, let alone die. Indeed, that was the very opposite of normal expectations. The messiah was supposed to be leading the triumphant fight against Israel’s enemies, not dying at their hands. (This points out the disciples’ disbelief at Jesus’ pronouncements of his suffering and death.)

Jesus seems to have combined the idea of the Servant as messiah but would also be a sufferer. As Jesus’ studied the scripture, he allowed his study to shape his sense of what he had to do. His task, he believed, was to bring the great story of Israel to its decisive climax. The long range plan of God the creator – to rescue the world from evil and to put everything to rights at last – was going to come true in him. His death, which at one level could rightly be seen as an enormous miscarriage of justice, would also be the moment when, as the prophet Isaiah had said, Jesus would be wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities” (Isa. 53.5). God’s plan to rescue the world from evil would be put into effect by evil doing its worst to the Servant – that is, to Jesus himself – and thereby exhausting its power.

Gospel Intentionality

I've seen this a couple of places but I really liked it and hope for this in the campus ministry/mission we are involved in:

Steve Timmis posted a series of Tweets on this: Living ordinary life with gospel intentionality means …

… buying from local shops.
… frequenting a local coffee shop or pub.
… playing for a local sports team.
… always tipping generously in local restaurants.
… being the kind of neighbor everyone wants to have as a neighbor.
… volunteering at a local charity shop along with a couple of others from church.
… doing ordinary things in community.
… opening your home to, and sharing your food with others.
… walking the same route to work at the same time or catching the same train each day.
… we do EVERYTHING for the sake of the gospel!

Yet More from Tribes

Discomfort

In other words, if everyone could do it, they would, and it wouldn’t be worth much.

It’s uncomfortable to stand up in front of strangers.

It’s uncomfortable to propose an idea that might fail.

It’s uncomfortable to challenge the status quo.

It’s uncomfortable to resist the urge to settle.

Followers

An organization needs people who aren’t just willing to follow, but are eager to follow. Folks who do nothing but mindlessly follow instructions let you down in two ways. First, they’re not going to do the local leadership required when the tribe members interact.

Second, they’re not going to do a very good job of recruiting new members to your tribe. That’s because evangelism requires leadership. Leading someone toward giving up one worldview and embracing yours isn’t easy and it’s not always comfortable. It’s the microleaders in the trenches and their enthusiastic followers who make the difference.

Tribes are increasingly voluntary. No one is forced to work for your firm or attend your services. People have a choice of which music to listen to and which movies to watch. So great leaders don’t try to please everyone. Great leaders do not water down their message in order to make the tribe a bit bigger. Instead, they realize that a motivated, connected tribe in the midst of a movement is far more powerful than a larger group could be.

Good Quote

This is from Michael Bird, from his book Introducing Paul:

“Our churches, some American ones in particular, need to spend less time telling non-Christians how to cope with being ‘left behind’ and start teaching Christians that to know Christ means to have fellowship with his sufferings and to be conformed to his death (Phil. 3:10)! For one day the prosperity bubble will burst and the lawless one will be revealed” (p. 118).

HT: Craig Blomberg

Another Positive

Something good came out of Michael Jackson's death/memorial service. I got to introduce my daughter to the greatness of Weird Al Yankovic.
Enjoy:


Unable to embed "Fat", but it is here: "Fat"

A Few Michael Jackson Thoughts...

Saw a retrospective on Michael Jackson's music on some music video channel tonight. Made me remember something. Michael Jackson hasn't really been relevant for me for over 20 years. Off of the "Bad" album, I really only liked "The Way You Make Me Feel." I liked the "Thriller" videos much better than the music. (I was too cool to own Thriller, my brother bought it). But I did remember how much I loved the album "Off the Wall." "Rock with You", "Don't Stop til You Get Enough", "Off the Wall," "Got Me Working Day and Night", now those were the Michael Jackson songs I liked. I think I did the splits and ripped my pants at a homecoming dance to "Don't Stop..."
I got creeped out by the face changes from Thriller to Bad that I just lost all interest. That's my pop culture minute for the day.

More (again) on Simply Christian

One of the areas where I really enjoy Wright is when he discusses Jesus, the Kingdom and Jesus' role within the history of God's dealing with Israel. His book, The Challenge of Jesus is one of my favorite books. Here are some of his thoughts that I pulled from his chapter on "Jesus and the Kingdom" from Simply Christian.

Jesus and the Coming of God’s Kingdom
Christianity is about something that happened. Something that happened to Jesus of Nazareth. Something that happened through Jesus of Nazareth. Christianity is not about a new moral teaching. We need to insist that we find in Jesus’ teaching within a larger framework: the story of things that happened through which the world was changed.
We are invited – summoned actually – to discover, through following Jesus, that this new world is indeed a place of justice, spirituality, relationship, and beauty, and that we are not only to enjoy it as such but to work at bringing it to birth on earth as in heaven.

What Can We Know About Jesus?
In Jesus of Nazareth heaven and earth have come together once and for all. The place where God’s space and our space intersect and interlock is no longer the Temple in Jerusalem. It is Jesus himself. This chapter also had some good stuff on the reliability of the gospels and our information about Jesus' resurrection.

The Kingdom of God
“The kingdom of God is at hand.” This announcement was the center of Jesus’ public proclamation. He was addressing the world we described at the end of the previous chapter, the world in which the Jewish people were anxious for their God to rescue them from pagan oppression and put the world to rights – in other words, to become king fully and finally.
What did he mean? The prophet Isaiah, in line with several Psalms and other biblical passages, had spoken of God’s coming kingdom as the time when
a) God’s promises and purposes would be fulfilled,
b) Israel would be rescued from pagan oppression,
c) evil (particularly the evil of oppressive empires) would be judged, and
d) God would usher in a new reign of justice and peace.
To speak of God’s kingdom arriving in the present was to summon up that entire narrative, and to declare that it was reaching its climax. God’s future was breaking in to the present. Heaven was arriving on earth.
Jesus believed that the ancient prophecies were being fulfilled. He believed that Israel’s God was doing a new thing; renewing and reconstituting Israel in a radical way…It wasn’t a matter of the God of Israel simply fighting off the wicked pagans and vindicating his own people. It was more devastating. It was about God judging not only the pagans but also Israel…God was issuing a fresh challenge to Israel, echoing back to his promises to Abraham: Israel is indeed the light of the world, but its present policies have been putting that light under a bucket.

Jesus’ healings were not just for the sake of it. Nor was it just a way of attracting people to listen to his message. Rather, the healing was a dramatic sign of the message itself. God, the world’s creator, was at work through him, to do what he had promised, to open blind eyes and deaf ears, to rescue people, to turn everything right side up.

What did Jesus intend by it all? What did he think would happen next? Why did he walk into trouble in this way? And why, after his own violent death, did anyone take him seriously any longer, let alone suppose that he was the living embodiment of the one true God?