Theology of Vocation (Pt.4 Messiah)
+ Messiah: The Human with God's Vocation
As Lent passes into Holy Week, we follow Jesus to his cross. But who is this Jesus, and why should we follow him? The claim is that he's the messiah, but what does it mean for this Jesus to be the messiah?
To answer these questions, let's break it down to it's simplest form according to the path we've been following in this 7 part series.
Obviously, the most general thing we can say about Jesus is that he's a creature. There are some critics out there who will claim Jesus never even existed, but these people are ignorant, i.e. uneducated even according to their own principles. History provides us non-biblical evidence that Jesus actually lived and led a movement within Israel in the first century. Like all creatures (see part 1), he is called into being with the vocation to praise God.
Secondly, Jesus is obviously a creature of the human kind. To be human is to be created in the image of God, dispersed throughout the world to be the ones through whom God reigns the universe (see part 2). Within this general vocation of humanity, each person is also called into a personal vocation, a way unique to his or her spiritual gifts and situation in life through which God reigns. Personally, I'm discerning God calling me to equip the church with congregational leaders who are astute theologians and with theologians who are transformational congregational leaders. What is God calling you to be and gifting you to do so that God reigns the universe through you?
We can see Jesus' personal answer to this question by what he says and does. Jesus announces the reign of God is here and now, and specifically, that God's reign is present in him. Or to say it another way, Jesus' unique personal vocation is to be the kingdom of God. New Testament scholar N.T. Wright puts it like this: Jesus is the messiah because he is and does for Israel and the world that which only God can be and do. He is the fulfillment of covenant (see part 3).
This is a significant move for theology, because it breaks us out of foreign philosophical categories to understand how Jesus is both human and divine. Traditional theology speaks of "two natures" in Jesus, his human nature and his divine nature. The problem is that no one know God's "nature". So traditionally, we've pre-judged what it means to be God (attributes such as omnipotence, omniscience, etc.), then we tried to figure out how these characteristics are communicated to Jesus' human nature. Instead of this nonsense, we can understand Jesus vocationally. We've already described how we can understand his humanity vocationally. Likewise, we can understand God vocationally. God is the kingdom of God, also called in the Bible the kingdom of heaven. Jews have so much honor for the name/word "God" that they often won't say it. So instead they speak of "heaven", meaning by that "God". So who God is is heaven. And what heaven is is God. For us to be in the kingdom of God means that we are in God. Therefore, Jesus is both human and divine, because he is the one in whom the human vocation and the divine vocation are the same. In Hebrew, we can speak of Jesus as the "shekinah", God's glorious presence (aka God in person).
This is a significant move for the mission of the church, because it breaks us out of thinking our faith is all about us -- regarding both quietism and evangelism. First, my tribe of Christians called Lutherans have a history of quietism, of lacking activism. I don't mean secular social activism, just simply living our worship to God through our actions. We often have an alergy to good works because of our resistance to works righteousness. But if we follow this Jesus to the cross and see how it is he defines being the messiah, then we come to understand that our good works are not simply in response to the gospel but participate in the gospel. What makes Jesus radically different from other people who claimed to be the messiah is that he doesn't just lead others into the kingdom of God; rather he announces the kingdom of God is present in him -- that he embodies God's reign. He is the properly built Temple for the shekinah. When he is crucified, the Temple curtain separating the Holy of Holies from the sanctuary is torn in two. There is no longer a physical barrier between God's glorious presence (shekinah) and God's people and the universe. God's kingdom is no longer confined to one physical location -- neither the Temple in Jerusalem or Jesus' body. When he is risen from the dead, Jesus breathes Holy Spirit into his followers.
So again, what is unique of Jesus way of being messiah through his crucifixion and resurrection is that he incorporates us into his embodied reign of God. We share in his messiahship. We are called into his mission. God reigns through us. Quietism is not an option. It's not o.k. just to believe in Jesus and not participate in the Body of Christ gathered on Sunday mornings. Nor is it o.k. just to worship on Sundays then not be the Body of Christ dispersed throughout the world the rest of the week. We have a mission to do, and it's Jesus' mission.
Likewise, we need not evangelize people by getting the "lost" to believe in Jesus so they can go to heaven after they die. Jesus mission is to bring heaven to us. We are to keep our eyes peeled to see the kingdom of God in our midst, even in the most unlikeliest of places like a crucified messiah, so we can get involved in the kingdom there. Rather than fretting over whether good people who don't know Jesus will have their "soul" sent to hell after they die, we can see Holy Spirit active in their life incorporating them into the kingdom of God, the very body of Jesus. Then we can invite them to recognize Jesus already transforming their lives, bringing heaven to them even now before they die.
One of the key aspects of covenant I forgot to include in the last post, is that God makes covenants with someone for the benefit of a third party. For example, God makes a covenant with Abraham for the blessing of the nations. God's covenant with Israel is for the salvation of the world. So eternal salvation is not only a matter between me and God, once I believe in Jesus. Rather, when I believe in Jesus such that I follow him in his mission, the people I encounter and the world I steward come to experience the kingdom of God here and now.
Look for the rest of this 7 part series on the theology of vocation:
+ Creation: God Calls Creation into Being
+ Humanity: The Creature with the Priestly Vocation
+ Covenant: God Calls Creation into Right Relationship
(Still to come:)
+ Trinity: God is the Fulfillment of Covenant, the Purpose of Creation
+ Salvation: All Creation Participates in the Fulfillment of Covenant
+ Church: The People Called into God's Vocation
3 comments:
IF you were ever to expand this section (like, say, in a book or something), I'd like to see you make more of a deal of how Jesus is God because Jesus forgives people of their sins. It wasn't so much that Jesus was healing people and performing miracles that got the religous hedgehogs all worked up as it was his proclaiming that people's sins were forgiven. And in the proclamation of this forgiveness the reign of God happens. How could a man take the position of God who alone can be our final Judge? By speaking more about how Jesus is judge (final part of second article in both creeds) can we talk more about the nature of God--which gets us away from those nasty ontological categories of 'impassibility and omniscience' that are helpful for SAT vocab tests but not good theology anymore. :) God is God because God alone can judge creation for not living its vocation (eh?). No-thing else can do this.
The thing we learn about our Judge, however, is that we don't have a unsympathetic judge who cares little about creation, but a judge who takes upon the verdict for creation's impossibility to live out vocation. Hence we can live beyond our inability to live into vocation through power of Spirit who presents the "beyond" to us here and now.
What say ye?
You got it, Paul. That's where my thought is going if I had more space to write. The whole point of my "glory christology" (which, by the way is St. Paul's christology too) is that when we say Jesus is the shekinah, we are saying he has the authority to forgive sins (not the Temple in Jerusalem). This ability is proper only to God. Yet Jesus does it. What is even more scandalous, however, is that Jesus breathes Holy Spirit on his followers to give them the same authority to forgive sins. We share in his messiahship.
I'm really enjoying reading your posts. Very well thought out. I find myself remembering things that were previously forgotten:) Your thoughts on vocation helped clear a few things up in my mind while I was writing my thesis. thank you for posting your work.
Karen
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