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Jesus
Christ’s vision has been crucial in shaping the religious convictions of
what is now one fourth of humankind. What he did as the Incarnate Son of God
has had lasting consequences for all human beings.
However, I must start by pointing out a frequent
misconception. Some people have a very naive idea of the mystery of the
Incarnation. If Jesus was God’s Son, they think, he knew from the start
everything there was to know. Therefore, he must have expressed in the Gospel a
detailed master plan for all time to come. All we need to do is to read the
Gospels attentively and execute what Jesus tells us to do.
This
is not the way the Incarnation happened. When ‘the Word was made
flesh’ (John 1,14) we received a high priest who was like us in
every respect, except sin (Hebrews 4,15). Note: in every respect.
That means: he thought and spoke in a human language. He had to learn and
discover new things as we have to do. He shared the
knowledge and the ignorance of his contemporaries. Only in that way did he
become truly like us.
The
Gospels confirm this. Jesus was no walking divine encyclopedia. As a child he
grew in wisdom and charm (Luke 2,52). Jesus could be amazed when something
happened which he had not expected (Matthew 8,10; Mark 6,6). The Gospel
episodes show that he responded to events and to people as he encountered them.
Jesus was terribly upset when he realised that his opponents were planning to
kill him (Matthew 16,21 - 17,8). It helped him grow in a
fuller understanding of his mission.
Jesus’ vision of the world as ‘the kingdom of his Father’,
contained the seeds of dramatic revolutionary change. But it is not correct to
say that he foresaw all its implications or future developments. Jesus’
human limitations did not permit him to.
Neither was it necessary for him to know or spell out in detail what needed to
come. As a good, enabling teacher, he left the working
out of his vision to future generations.
This
means that we should not expect to find in the Gospels a clear expression of
those social and religious principles that are now part of our Christian
heritage. Among them: democracy, the abolition of slavery, the freedom of
speech, racial equality, a nation’s right to self determination, the
emancipation of women, and a just division of the world’s resources, and
so on.
Nothing human was foreign to him
Jesus’ role in history was far more radical than spelling out the details
of a future society or a future Church. By being ‘God among us’
(Matthew 1,23) he brought about in his very person the start of a new
reality. For the presence of God was not presented in the image of a powerful,
rich, political leader. It was seen in the face of Jesus, a peasant with a
Galilean accent. ‘Who sees me, sees the Father’, Jesus said (John
14,9).
The
Gospels stress that, from the first moment of his life, Jesus identified fully
with those considered the least and the lowest. Luke narrates on purpose how
the infant Jesus was born in a stable built for animals and how he was laid in
a manger, the way poor people take care of babies. To welcome him, God did not
choose a delegation of the political or religious elite, but a group of
shepherds — a despised and impoverished social class of people (Luke
2,1-20).
Jesus
lived most of his life in Nazareth, an incredibly small hamlet. He was
‘the builder’, that is: the local handyman who took on all jobs that
were going: sharpening a tool, repairing a tottering wall, fixing a leaky roof
or replacing a wooden door (Mark 6,3; Matthew 13,55). As a
travelling preacher, he walked barefoot, with no clothes except for what he was
wearing, with no purse for money nor a bag for provisions (Matthew
10,9-10).
Jesus
died the death which the Romans had reserved for rebellious slaves. That is why
Paul says (Philippians 2,7-8):
He emptied himself
to assume the condition of a slave
and became like (other) human beings.
And as a human being, he
humbled himself
and became obedient unto death,
yes,
death on a cross.
The
moment of Jesus’ final surrender to the love of his Father was also the
moment of his fullest identification with human beings in their rejection and
suffering. For God loves human beings and has empathy with their suffering.
That is, no doubt, the meaning of his exclamation:
‘When I am lifted from the earth,
I will draw all human
beings to myself’.
John 12,32
Jesus, the peasant from Galilee, the handyman, the barefoot preacher, died on a
cross as the scum of the earth. In his hours of agony he descended into the
depths of human loneliness and rejection, and became one with slaves, losers
and underdogs. But he rose again to life and glory, and rising he took all
human beings with him.
When we were baptised in Christ Jesus, we entered the tomb and joined him in
death.
This happened in order that, as Christ was raised from the
dead by the Father’s glory, we too in like manner might walk in the
newness of life.
Romans 6,4
Notice that no one is excluded, whatever their race, class, sex or social
status. Christ, the champion of the underdog, liberated women too by making
them share as much as men in his universal priesthood. Denying women the fruits
of the liberation Christ won for them by appealing to the fact that he did not
include women in his team of apostles is a grave mistake, indeed.
John Wijngaards
Follow @JohnWijngaards
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