The Story
THE OPENING SCENE
Jesus was a historical figure, not a mythological god of another realm but an embodied human. Jesus’ story, like all of history, starts at the beginning. His life was set within the cultural context of first century Palestine and rests within the larger Jewish story. The Jewish people understood ‘the beginning’ as the creation, not a random, purposeless or purely material event but a designed beginning with a purpose, a plan and a destination.
Humans were the crown jewel of creation, conscious beings made in the image of and in relationship with the creator. Where did matter-energy and code-information come from? How were these organized so intricately to result in the world that we now experience?
life is a playground
Jesus affirmed the Jewish ideas of a good and loving creator God whose agenda is a beautiful, peaceful, and just world where humans would experience the fullness of joy and pleasure. Jesus refers to God as His father. God ‘the father’ served as the best metaphor for Jesus’ audience to relate to in that our creator was akin to a good, loving, and providing father. So, to extend the metaphor, we might think of the created world as a sort of playground and humans as God’s children. This sets the scene of the ‘opening act’ so to speak, a loving father creates a good playground for his children. His will is to be with them as they enjoy the world He has created. He wants a world without bullies, stingy hoarders, polluters, vandals or violent haters. We will discover that He wants everyone to be included and no-one is left out, because we are all His children.
Selfishness destroys
Yet, the agenda of the loving father was not realized. Humans, made in his image, have the ability to imagine multiple emergent future outcomes and therefore have a sort of free will and ability to create. This consciousness can be used for good, such as creating amazing works of art and building communities, or it can be used to pull people apart and destroy the project. God offers us a good playground, but we co-create the world that we live in. It was soon revealed we prefer darkness and a world full of violence, injustice and pollution. We rebelled against the purpose of creation and God’s agenda. So, selfishness that causes suffering entered the playground. Bullies and exploiters, the violent, uncaring, unloving, and oppressors began to destroy the playground. The result is that many are excluded, live in fear, are abused and enslaved. The project has gone wrong, and the world needs to be made right.
God's chosen people
The loving father intervened by choosing a group of people (the Jewish people) to bring the playground back to its original purpose and restore the world, to make right the spoiled relationships. He sent His law to Moses so His people would know what to do and set up a temple, a place to dwell in His presence. They appointed priests who offered sacrifices for the forgiveness of sins, instituted kings and judges to oversee His people and spoke words of warning and correction through the prophets. Yet these interventions were just a foretaste of the ultimate solution that was yet to come. The Messiah of the Jews was the promised future king who was expected to save the Jewish nation, rebuild the temple, and usher in the messianic age or kingdom of God. In this age, peace would be restored, evil destroyed, and all people would follow the law of God.
jesus to the rescue
Enter Jesus, the savior of the world. Fulfilling the multitude of prophecies about the Messiah, Jesus claimed to be the long-awaited king. But he was more than the expected Messiah who would bring salvation to the Jewish people. He was the very presence of God on the earth, the lord of creation who had come to make things right. Now, finally, the just, peaceful and beautiful playground could be restored. He ushered in an age of new creation. Jesus embodied the temple, the high priest and the sacrifice. He is also the ultimate prophet and judge. All that was hoped for and much more is fulfilled in Jesus. God has become king and saviour.
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There are two different forms of power. The rulers of the nations, he says, order people, bully them and so on. He says, “We’re not going to do it like that – we’re going to do it the other way – by the power of servanthood. The Son of Man didn’t come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” We’ve allowed ourselves to think that we can tell Jesus’ story with the resurrection as a kind of nice happy ending, as an afterthought. But the point is, now that sin has been dealt with, new creation can begin. That’s where the kingdom of God comes in.
scandalous
The Jews of Jesus’ day living under the oppressive hand of the Roman Empire were hoping that the Messiah would build a physical temple and establish an earthly kingdom of political power for God’s people, the Jews. Jesus, however, brought a scandalous twist to the Jewish hopes of a Messiah. First, he widened the circle of God’s grace to include everybody, regardless of ethnic background, everywhere, the whole world. The story was dramatically modified when the one true creator God claims and rescues the world that had gone wrong. He destroyed the insider and outsider binaries of Jew-Gentile and sinner-faithful and, instead, welcomed sinners, Samaritans, tax collectors and even the spiritually oppressed. It was a scandal… Jesus the messiah and God the king has saved everyone, the whole world. No one is left outside his grace and there is no ‘other’, no gentile, infidel or unsaved. The temple, the place of presence of God, was being replaced by the embodiment of God as a man. Devotion to him demonstrated by obedience to the law of love became the new gate that anyone can enter. The conclusion was a clear threat to the rulers of Jesus’ day. The ultimate authority on earth was Jesus… the king of kings. This meant that he was a threat to the Roman Empire. As the high priest, now among us, religious authorities were also displaced by his proclamation. And now the law of God was written on the hearts of men and there was no need for a teacher. The author and the spirit of truth was among them.
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The result was predictable: the teachers, priests, and government officials conspired together to crucify him. In doing so, they exposed one further scandalous truth. Now there is no need for sacrifice because Jesus has forgiven our sins and has become the perfect lamb that took away the sin of the world. Through one man, salvation came as a free gift to all creation. There was now no need for religious mediation. God had broken into the playground and the new creation age was instituted. Time to make the playground right!
invitation
This is where our story intersects with Jesus’ story. This new creation age continues to this day, and we are included in God’s sure commitment to the world. His promise to forgive sins and make the world right is guaranteed by His faithful character. We are declared good by God’s grace. Jesus has taken the evil of the world upon himself on the cross and made it possible for us to flourish free from evil. We are invited to participate in this relationship and respond to his forgiveness and freedom from slavery to selfishness, ego and death. Responding correctly is to follow His law of love that is written on our hearts. Each of us is conscious of what is good and bad. Anthropologists often point out the great ethical variety in the cultures of the world… but everywhere there is a universal sense of the ‘good neighbor’ and the ‘bad neighbor’. Although the specifics of what constitutes a loving act and a selfish act may change, what constitutes a good neighbour is one who, more often than not, does the loving thing.
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Jesus, the ‘lord of creation’, is not dependent upon us believing in Him. Either He is or is not regardless of what we think. We all make our choice not by what we say or claim, but by how we live. We can rebel against his law and justify our behaviour or even lash out in hate against symbols of Jesus’ authority. We can participate in the new creation kingdom by living as if Jesus is God and following the ethical demands of being a good neighbor. His forgiveness and free gift of rescue is for us all. Yet some of us respond correctly through uniting with Him, following the spirit of truth that guides our actions.
spiritual transformation
Regardless of how you identify, the cultural background that you come from, or the religion of your family, Jesus’ promise of born-again spiritual transformation is available to you. You can be free from evil, sin, and pain and have the fruit of the Spirit, including love, joy, peace, patience and kindness bubble up from you as a living spring of water. We must only abide in Jesus. He is not far from us. We exist in Him and we have our being in Him. To abide, we need to first surrender to His shaping hand, His grace and His purpose. Then, we daily put to death the ego, cravings and boastings of what we have and what we have done. Instead, we should abide in Him daily. Through spiritual practice, meditation, prayer, and intention, we can draw near to God in the Spirit. We will see, in the combination of surrender and drawing near, a sort of relational momentum that produces a love, generosity and humility that mirrors the life of Christ. We will become like Him by being with Him. This is His desire, and it is available to each of us.
demonstration
Those who respond correctly, becoming Jesus’ kingdom people, are tasked to join a new creation mission, to do the will of the Father and restore peace, justice and beauty to the playground. Remember the goal – God’s agenda has always been to restore and make the world right. Jesus modelled service and grace as the new way to subdue evil. His way is a combination of humility of spirit and authority of truth demonstrated in right action. His ministry was marked by the recovery of sight to the blind, freedom from captivity and justice for the oppressed. We can accomplish this task by demonstrating kingdom love and radical generosity in community with each other. We are distinguished by our love for each other, an intimate community that is intentionally heterogeneous and inclusive. We also organize to do good works in our local communities through unselfish service that relieves suffering. We follow Jesus’ example of doing good deeds. This is God’s antidote to sin and the selfish deeds of those in rebellion to the law of God in their hearts.
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Jesus’ people act as first responders even to the point of sacrifice, following Jesus’ example of ultimate love. They take the sins of the world, the pollution, the hate and the greed upon themselves and return good for evil, love for violence/hate, beauty for pollution, and generosity for poverty/thievery. They welcome immigrants, invite the homeless in, care for those unable to care for themselves, clean up the environment and add beauty, art, and sustainable stewardship of natural resources. Moreover, they are peacemakers forging reconciliation between broken communities working to repair splintered relationships.
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Finally, Jesus’ people encourage others to become loyal to Jesus, knowing that the ultimate hope in the world will be realized by changing hearts and minds. In order to complete this task, Jesus promised the power of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit provides us with spiritual gifts of hospitality, wisdom, knowledge, healing, guidance and speaking the truth with compelling authority, among others. Jesus transforms us through his Spirit so that we can work to transform our communities, the world and the playground by this same Spirit. The Holy Spirit works in us and through us.
hope and warning
We have seen that the story is not about otherworld escapism or manipulating an angry God so that our souls can drift into eternity in the clouds. It is about God loving his creation and instituting a reclamation and restoration project. Our future hope and the warning of God’s coming in judgment is also not about the disembodied destinations of heaven or hell. It is about the new creation and resurrected body. It is about God’s offer and our participation (or not) in His rule. We can expect a future determined by our actions, whether we take up or rebel against God’s offer. The wrath of God is already being poured out on those who rebel in violence, injustice, greed and pollution, resulting in pain, suffering, fear, and hopelessness. Faith is about what one does, not what one says. Although many say that Jesus is king, few live according to His teachings.
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Jesus’ people have hope that the story does not end with their death. They have hope that Jesus’ resurrection was a foretaste of their own resurrection and bodily participation in a new heaven and new earth no longer corrupted by evil. We can all be comforted in that God’s righteousness is also about love, grace, mercy and faithfulness to our whole ‘messed up’ world. He took sin upon Himself, forgave us and offers a new life and new creation. So, it is possible that all will be forgiven, nothing will be lost and all will wake up into new creation. Yet, we must warn those who cause suffering that it is possible they will be excluded from the age to come. Jesus was a harsh judge of corrupt politicians, wealthy exploiters who hoard resources, those who fail to help people in need, religious oppressors, judgmental hypocrites who profit by condemning sinners, and those who load down the broken with demands of money, time and loyalty to their ministries. To these evils, we must shame and warn of God’s impending just and loving judgment to come.