Mark 9
It is possible to imagine some cruel despot in charge of the universe who would force us to affirm what was obviously false in order to avoid the pain that he could inflict upon us. It is easy for a person to become convinced that our faith is something like that, something so inherently illogical, that he might suppose that mere belief in God could only come to the most gullible person, or to someone who lived with a deranged fear of an unknown or imaginary power. The truth of the real God, the God who has loved us at the cost of His own Son, is so entirely different from this kind of horrific caricature.
When the true God visited us, He healed those in pain. The true God pointed us toward a life of willing self-denial and service. The true God showed His closest disciples a glimpse of the glories of the kingdom to come, a kingdom that required the death of the Son of God. In the transfiguration of Jesus, God gave us a wonderfully merciful display for our weak faith, a display that assures us of the truth of who Jesus is, and of the truth of the kingdom that He has won for us that will be revealed on the last day.
Our God does not take away our minds or our emotions. He does not send us to some reeducation camp where we learn to affirm Christian doctrine against our will. He does no violence to the will of his creatures in enabling us to embrace Christ as He is offered to us in the gospel. The earliest disciples of Jesus were not chosen based on their ability to grasp the truth of the Messiah, or for their blind obedience in mindlessly mouthing faith declarations that they either rejected or could not really affirm. Peter, James, and John did not understand the meaning of the transfiguration of Christ in the presence of Moses and Elijah until after the resurrection of Jesus. They heard the instruction from on high calling them to listen to Jesus as the beloved Son of God, but there was no threat of torture awaiting them for being slow to embrace God’s method of mercy to humanity through the gift of His Son.
The one who would suffer for them would be the King of the kingdom. This is not the way that abusive regimes gain and hold on to power, but it is the only way to begin to understand the life of Jesus Christ. He dealt with unbelief. He encountered the desperation of thousands of people who desired to be made whole. He heard complaints about His disciples, about His teaching, and often about the circumstances surrounding His healings. Yet He performed all kinds of wonderful acts of mercy for those who believed. He was not asking anyone to believe in a round square, or when feeling the pain of life to pretend that it was pleasure, or to deny their senses. He was asking them to believe what their eyes saw, what their ears heard, and what their minds could reasonably consider. Here is a child thrashing about. You can see him there with his desperate father. In a moment there was an obvious change. The boy looked like he was dead, but then Jesus took him by the hand, and he was well. This was not irrational. It was powerful.
Our redemption is not procured through assertions of vague spirituality or unreasonable philosophy. We have been saved through the perfectly reasonably payment of a suffering substitute. This is not abusive to us or to Him. It is just amazingly generous. Even the resurrection of Jesus is not a belief in a story without historical basis. It is the most sensible fact of theology and of history. If there is no resurrection of the Messiah, we are left with massive biblical and theological holes in our faith, and we are also at a loss to explain historically what happened in order to bring about the Christian movement and the fact of the empty tomb.
These realities are to be received by a follower of Jesus with the innocence of a child who trusts, but they are not an assault against our reason, our senses, or our consciences. They form a wonderful fabric of theology and history that we can explore, consider, and embrace. Even beyond these truths, we are invited to receive, not a mythical person, or a pretend hero, but to open our lives up to the gracious reality of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
In we would receive this Christ, we are led into a life that is truly good. The Christian ethic is not the horror of some meaningless and brutal survival of the fittest. It is a way of life that loves both justice and mercy. Our religion is historical fact and experiential reality that leads us in the way of humble service. It is a way of living that has room for the weak and the damaged. It is a life that does not require us to pretend that there is no moral category that we can rightly call evil. We have a gospel that calls us to admit the evil within us. Yet it is not a story that leaves us wallowing in a pool of our own blood. It is a faith of the greatest rescue and mercy.
Christ and the way of the cross could never stand if it were a myth forced upon the powerless by the powerful. It simply could never work that way. It is an historical fact, and a present change of life, that gives us confidence about a promised future. It is good. It is true. It is beautiful. Through it we are moved to humble acts of service for those who can do nothing for us in return. Through it we are given the desire and power to make necessary changes of life. In our hearts we know it to be more than right. It is deeply satisfying to our best use of our capacities for reasoning and our consideration of both the world and the Scriptures. Nothing else will set our heart, soul, mind, and strength at rest. It is a faith that we willingly embrace as people who willingly admit our sin and weakness at the foot of our Savior’s atoning cross. We willingly say these words together with an honest man so long ago, a man who knew that he needed Jesus, “I believe; help my unbelief.”
posted by Pastor Magee @ 9:21 PM
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