Believing the unbelievable
Commentary
If baptism is where we begin our Lenten journey, the next step of that journey is surely faith. To set out on any journey calls for some faith, doesn't it? We need to believe that we can make the journey and arrive at our destination. A trip requires that we trust there is something desirable about the destination. And it necessitates that we believe we know the way to that destination. Beginning the pilgrimage through these forty days of Lent calls for faith.
Yet sometimes it seems we are asked to believe the unbelievable, and believing becomes very difficult. Some have the ability to enable people to realize they have more potential than they themselves or others are inclined to recognize. Many find it hard to believe that they could excel at anything at all. Nurturing a belief in something that seems unbelievable is tough.
In a sense, every Christian is invited to believe what seems unbelievable at times. Discipleship begins in baptism but soon takes that next step of believing against all the odds. Ironically, faith matures to the degree that we are willing to trust God and ourselves to accomplish the impossible. This fundamental feature of faith is scattered about in our three lessons for this second Sunday in Lent and knits them together into a continuous discussion.
Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16
God's covenant with Abraham and Sarah provides the initial foundation for the Hebrew people. The Hebrews traced their origin back to Abraham and Sarah and thereby discovered the roots of their faith. This passage is one of the several constitutive covenants in the First Testament that formed the religion of the people of Israel. Probably the most definitive of those covenants is the one made at Sinai (Exodus 19-20).
In God's covenant with Abraham and Sarah, we see the primary ingredients of an agreement that alters a relationship. God takes the initiative to confront Abraham and lays out the conditions of the agreement. Abraham's part is stated clearly: "Walk before me, and be blameless" (v. 1). Later (vv. 9-14) Abraham is ordered to practice circumcision and that is presented as both the sign and a requirement of the covenant. The rest of the assigned passage is devoted to what God promises to do. Nonetheless, there is enough required of Abraham to make this a "conditional" covenant, that is, an agreement in effect only so long as both parties do what they have agreed to do.
The context for this covenant is the whole of the Abraham and Sarah story that begins in chapter 12. Their story commences when, out of the blue, God calls the couple to pick up and move to a new land. Then amid their adventures, God confronts them again and enters into a covenant concerning the couple's descendants (15:1-21). The covenants in chapters 15 and 17 may be doublets, each coming from a different tradition. (For example, our passage is sometimes attributed to the so-called Priestly tradition and 15:1-21 to either the Elohist or the Yahwist traditions.) Our lesson comes immediately after the abortive effort to provide Abraham an offspring by means of Hagar. Therefore, the obvious question is how this couple is to become a "great nation" (12:2) when they cannot conceive even a single child.
The reading is comprised of only two parts: The covenant with Abraham (17:1-7) and with Sarah (17:15-16). What is omitted are the elaborate instructions about circumcision as a feature of the covenant relationship (vv. 8-14) and Abraham's response to God's promise concerning Sarah (vv. 17-27). Within the reading the major themes are the covenant itself, the promise of descendants and international prominence, and the giving of new names.
The making of the covenant is entirely a result of God's initiative and utter dependence on what God will do. God is identified as God Almighty (El Shaddai in the Hebrew), so that there will be no confusing this God with others. The covenant is entirely verbal, that is, God makes a covenant with Abraham and Sarah simply through speaking. Furthermore, the agreement carries over to all the couple's descendants ("between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout the generations," v. 7), so that the covenant has no time limit.
Certainly the most prominent feature of the passage is the promise of descendants and international prominence. In effect, God says the same thing over and over again in only slightly different words. To summarize all of this, Abraham and Sarah are promised numerous progeny that become a myriad of famous and influential nations. This promise comprises the heart of the covenant. God pledges to bring all this to reality, in spite of how unlikely it may seem. But there is more to the promise: The couple's offspring will include kings. What a promise! Yet without promise there is no covenant.
That promise in the covenant makes Abraham and Sarah different people. Therefore each is given a new name. In Hebraic thought, name constituted being; nothing existed without a name (see Genesis 2:4b-20). Possessing God's promise changes basic identity, and Abram and Sarai are not the same people they were before. We might compare it to the adoption of a child. With formal adoption, the child takes the surname of her or his new parents. Rightly so, because with the adoption the child begins an entirely new life and is a new person.
What a promise it is they are asked to believe! An elderly childless couple who has already exhausted all their resources in an effort to conceive! They are now asked to believe they will have offspring so numerous as to provide the foundation for entirely new nations. The reading concludes before the narrative records Abraham's utter disbelief. In verse 17 he rolls on the ground in laughter at the thought that Sarah will give birth to nations. Later when Sarah hears the promise, she too laughs (18:9-15). It is a laughable, hilarious promise, so incredible that it sounds ridiculous. Yet the couple is asked to believe it -- asked to believe the unbelievable.
Romans 4:13-25
Paul uses Abraham and Sarah as the example of what he means by justification by God's grace (3:21-26). His motive for doing so is transparent. The founders of the Hebraic tradition had their faith "reckoned" as righteousness. So, Paul's view of God's justification is not some wildly novel invention but the core of the witness of the Hebrew Scriptures. It is not easy to understand fully what Paul always has in mind, but his primary point is crystal clear.
Chapter 4 begins with Paul's claim that Abraham was not justified by works but by faith and specifically made right with God before circumcision (vv. 1-12). The lesson itself begins with Paul's continuation of his main point and constitutes the conclusion of the argument begun in 4:1. Here, however, he wants to show that inheritance of the promise made to Abraham and Sarah was not contingent on works. The nations that come from this couple are related to God through faith because they inherit the promise God made to Abraham and Sarah. Our ancestors believed God's promise, and that belief (not any works they accomplished) was what made them acceptable to God. Their story is, therefore, the model of faith for all people.
The process of Paul's thought is a bit difficult to follow, but it seems to go something like this: If Law is the basis of relationship with God, then the divine promise has no value for us since it depends on works and not faith (vv. 3-15). However, since the promise depends on faith, it is accessible for all people (that is, both Jew and Gentile -- vv. 16-17). Abraham's faith was steadfast "hoping against hope" (vv. 15-21). Therefore, God regarded Abraham's faith as righteousness and now regards our faith in the same way (vv. 22-25).
Paul's commentary on the first lesson is understandable only if we have some sense of how he is using certain key words. The first of those is "righteousness." In this discussion, Paul seems to use this word to designate a right relationship with God and not simply a good moral life. God's righteousness is revealed in Christ. That means that in Christ we learn the divine intent to bring all humanity into relationship with their Creator (see 3:21). So, to be "justified" (that is, to be "made righteous") is to be brought into a right relationship with God. The right relationship entails being forgiven and declared righteous by God. The final term we need to understand is the one translated "reckoned" (vv. 22-24). The Greek word (logizomai) may be translated to reckon, to count, or to esteem. Paul's use of the word arises from his quotation of Genesis 15:6. The simplest way of understanding this is to say that God regarded faith (looked on faith, counted faith) as an indication of a right relationship.
Paul says Abraham and Sarah exhibited a radical kind of trust in relationship to God's promises. That kind of utter and absolute trust (which is the equivalent of faith) is our means of appropriating God's grace-filled act on our behalf. God accepts our faith in Christ, his death and resurrection, as a sign of our relationship with God (vv. 23-25).
To move out of Paul's thick and sometimes confusing theological language, we might put it this way. In Christ God makes a promise to us. It is a promise of love and intimacy with our Creator, the source of all life. God asks only that we believe the promise, trust it to be true and vital for our lives. We might compare it to parents promising their child they will always love them regardless of their behavior. They ask their child only to trust that promise and thereby live within the context of love and acceptance.
However, the promise seems incredible! Certainly there is something more that we must do! Surely God wants us to live good lives and, if we don't, will reject us. Certainly, we must go to church, pray, read our Bibles, and all the rest in order to win God's approval. But no! God's promise is not a conditional one. It does not lose its validity as a result of anything we do. How incredible that all God would ask of us is to trust this crazy promise. In this case trust is believing the unbelievable.
Mark 8:31-38
God's promise is as incredible as Jesus' teachings in this lesson. These verses are a continuation of Peter's declaration that Jesus is the Christ (vv. 27-30) and a prelude to the transfiguration story. It has two parts. In verses 31-33, in response to Peter's confession, Jesus predicts his death and resurrection, and a discussion of that prediction ensues between Jesus and Peter. In the second part of the reading, Jesus teaches the crowd the implications of his forthcoming suffering for discipleship (vv. 34-38).
The predictions of the passion in the Synoptic Gospels have several functions. On the purely literary level, they increase the suspense of the story as the reader wonders when and how this is going to happen. On a theological level, they indicate that Jesus' destiny was no surprise, that the cross was no distraction from and contradiction to what he intended to do, and that he accepted it. In this particular case, the prediction includes suffering, rejection, death, and resurrection. Jesus intentionally changes the language used by Peter and does not speak of himself as Messiah but as "Son of Man." He defines his own identity and refuses to fit any preconceived molds. The events are necessary ("must") because they fulfill some divine plan. The phrase "after three days" indicates that God would quickly raise Jesus to vindicate divine justice. As a whole, Jesus' words are a radical retort to Peter and his expectations. Jesus wants to be sure that Peter and the other disciples do not pigeonhole him as a certain sort of messiah.
The discussion with Peter ensues naturally, since Jesus' prediction seems to be a response to Peter's confession. Jesus has spoken plainly, so the disciples would have no doubt what he meant. Peter, however, is scandalized by such a prediction. Surely, God's agent for Israel's redemption would not end up like this! He "rebukes" Jesus, and then Jesus "rebukes" him. We have here a sort of reciprocal and mutual rebuking. The word "rebuke" is not accidently the same one Jesus uses to call out demons and unclean spirits (for example, see 1:25). Jesus and Peter each think the other is possessed by a demon! Jesus specifies what Peter's demon is. He calls Peter "Satan." Peter, who seems to have finally gotten it right by confessing Jesus is Messiah, is now equated with the forces of evil. He is thinking the way humans are inclined to think, in this case, in terms of power and glory.
The teachings concerning discipleship (vv. 34-38) draw the implications of Jesus' destiny for his followers. The first words (v. 34) are the prerequisite for discipleship and the general principle for it. We need to shift our attention away from ourselves, carry our own cross, and go the way Jesus leads us. "Cross" in this case surely means a literal cross. It is not used figuratively for some hardship or difficulty we might have. The disciples can expect to be crucified as their master was.
Jesus goes on to elaborate this general principle with four sentences each beginning with "for" (vv. 35, 36, 37, and 38). (The RSV translates "for" in each case, while the NRSV does not.) The elaboration demonstrates that there is a logic in all of this. Surrendering one's life in favor of the gospel message is the only way of gaining genuine and full life. This topsy-turvy view of life is the only value there is. All other so-called treasures are but distractions from what our existence is all about.
The final verse puts this sacrificial understanding of life in terms of a final assessment. "If you don't have the courage to believe in me now, then I will not be able to recognize you in the last day." The shame of which Jesus speaks has already been modeled for us in Peter's response to Jesus' prediction. It means to be scandalized, to be utterly embarrassed, and to reject it out of hand. Verse 1 of chapter 9 is the conclusion to this discourse and adds an urgency to the whole matter.
If we are honest, we see something of ourselves in Peter and his response to Jesus. It is incredible and indeed scandalous that God would accomplish human redemption through one who suffers and dies and must be rescued from death. The kind of life described here is just the opposite of the one that seems to make sense. Are we to believe that power is found in weakness, that suffering exhibits glory, and that surrendering life is the only way to live fully? That's asking us to believe the unbelievable.
Our lessons all come down to this point. What Christ asks of us is inconceivable. The Christian faith amounts to "hoping against hope," as Paul puts it, or believing that which does not seem worthy of our belief. To believe the unbelievable is to surrender our lives. We give up claim to rationality, to reason, and even to our own perception of reality. It is to say, in effect, that we can know or do nothing on our own. We junk our own pride and scrap our accom-plishments to trust a promise that exceeds the reaches of our mind. Hence, as a belief of the unbelievable, Christian faith is always a counter-cultural movement. It stands opposed to all our culture values and teaches us to value. There is every reason to be ashamed of Christ and to be scandalized by the gospel. Yet God's promise in Christ draws an unexplainable faith out of us, so that we end up believing the unbelievable.
Mark 9:2-9
See the discussion of this passage in our column for Transfiguration Sunday. The message of transfiguration story fits the theme of believing the unbelievable like a glove. It poses glory in the context of suffering, which is where the Gospel lesson for Transfiguration Sunday leads us. If Christ's glory is found only in the cross, then we have something incredible before us. Power and glory are turned upside down, even as they are in 8:30-38.
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16
We come in this passage to the Priestly version of God's promise to Abraham of a son. Just as we have four different accounts in the gospels of the life of Jesus, so in the Old Testament we sometimes have differing accounts of the lives of some of the leading Old Testament characters. And usually there are several accounts given because the person or event is so important in Israel's history. Such is the case of a promise of a son to Abraham and Sarah, the forebears of Israel. Genesis 12 and 18 record the J account of the promise. Genesis 15 comes from E, the Elohist. And this chapter stems from Priestly tradition. But each version agrees on the principal message. In the spring of the year, Sarah, the wife of Abraham, will give birth to an heir.
We are told in our text that Abraham is 99 years old when the promise is given, and Sarah is ninety (vv. 1, 17), but this story is not intended simply as a miracle tale. Rather it has to do with the universal purpose of God, as all of the biblical stories ultimately have to do with that purpose.
We are told in the scriptures that the Lord God created the earth good, full of life and running over with abundance. But we human beings, in our attempts to run our own lives and to make God unnecessary, have corrupted God's good creation and brought discord and death into all the world. As a result, the purpose of the Lord, according to the Bible, is to restore his creation to the goodness that he intended for it in the beginning. And to do that, God sets out to make a people, a new community, that knows how to live faithfully under his lordship in justice and righteousness and peace. It is God's intention, then, to draw all the families of the earth into that community and thus to establish his rule over all flesh, so that they know the blessings of abundant life in their fullness. God wants to make a new people in order that, through that people, he may bring his blessing on all people (cf. Genesis 12:3).
Whom does he choose to be the beginning of that new community of faith? He chooses Abraham and Sarah, semites of about the eighteenth century B.C., who at God's command, have abandoned their home in Mesopotamia and journeyed to the land of Canaan. From that aged couple God will bring forth a son named Isaac, who in turn will be the father of Jacob, and from whom then will issue forth the twelve forbears of the twelve tribes of Israel. Those people of Israel will be set apart to serve God's purpose as his "holy nation." They will mediate the knowledge of God to all the world as God's "kingdom of priests." And they will be the witnesses to God's working in human history, so that finally every nation will acknowledge God's lordship and praise and serve him as their God. Such is the purpose of the Lord according to the scriptures.
But why should God choose the people of Israel to be his special people? Some folks are very offended by the fact that Israel is the chosen people. As in the little poem by Ogden Nash: "How odd of God to choose the Jews." But the poem goes on: "Oh no it's not. God knows what's what." And indeed, God does. God chooses Israel because when he picks them out, they are no people. As Deuteronomy 7:7 states, "It was not because you were more in number than any other people ... for you were the fewest of all peoples." The Israelites were not a great nation like the Egyptians or Hittites of the time. In fact, they were just a ragged bunch of slaves, toiling in the mudpits of Egypt, when God chose them. And so you see, they could claim nothing for themselves. They could not say, "We were chosen because we were so great and deserved it." Rather, they had to confess that they were nothing, and that God's election of them was solely an act of loving grace on his part, totally undeserved and unearned.
And the same is true with God's choice of Abraham and Sarah. When God gives them a son to make them the forbears of the populous nation of Israel, the couple are not self-made candidates for the job -- not healthy twenty-year-olds who can easily conceive a child. They're in their nineties! They're past the age when people have babies! They also are not persons with great faith who deserve the special attention of God. In the verse immediately following our text for the morning, Abraham falls on his face and laughs when God tells him he will have a son (v. 17). And if you go on to chapter 18 in Genesis, Sarah laughs too (Genesis 18:12).
So you see, we are given to understand that the gift of a child, the birth of Isaac, is entirely God's work, and he alone is the one who is to be praised for such a fantastic development. God is the principal actor in all of these stories in the Bible, and everything he does is driving toward the fulfillment of that promise he has made to bring his blessing on all the peoples of the earth through Israel. God's love is doing the miraculous work of restoring his creation to the goodness that he wants for it. His love presses forward in these stories -- his overwhelming love that can overcome every obstacle to the fulfillment of his intention to save us all.
Do you realize that God is working in your life and mine in the same way? God wants to save us. He wants the abundant life for us that he intended for us in the beginning. And he is at work in our hearts and minds despite every obstacle -- despite our faithlessness, our wrongdoing, our indifference toward him, and our terrible, terrible ignorance of his character. Indeed, so ready is God to fulfill his purpose for our lives that he has even sent his beloved Son to die for us -- all because he loves us! "God so loved the world...!" You and me, your neighbor, your enemy, and all that host of humanity that has preceded us since the time of Abraham and that will follow us until God's kingdom comes. God loves! God loves the world! And the final proof of that love is his love in Jesus Christ.
More than that, good Christians, God has elected us too, like he elected Israel, to be his holy nation and kingdom of priests, and to mediate the knowledge of his love to all the world. He's still trying to make a new community, you see. He's still trying to fashion a people who knows how to live under his lordship in justice and righteousness and peace. Now that community is called the Christian Church, the new Israel in Jesus Christ. And God still wants us to draw all people into that community, that he may be all in all and that his rule may be confessed throughout the world. Well, the Lord God gave Sarah and Abraham a son when they were old and past the age of childbearing. It just may be that he can work an equal miracle in us, his church, if in faith we will let him.
Yet sometimes it seems we are asked to believe the unbelievable, and believing becomes very difficult. Some have the ability to enable people to realize they have more potential than they themselves or others are inclined to recognize. Many find it hard to believe that they could excel at anything at all. Nurturing a belief in something that seems unbelievable is tough.
In a sense, every Christian is invited to believe what seems unbelievable at times. Discipleship begins in baptism but soon takes that next step of believing against all the odds. Ironically, faith matures to the degree that we are willing to trust God and ourselves to accomplish the impossible. This fundamental feature of faith is scattered about in our three lessons for this second Sunday in Lent and knits them together into a continuous discussion.
Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16
God's covenant with Abraham and Sarah provides the initial foundation for the Hebrew people. The Hebrews traced their origin back to Abraham and Sarah and thereby discovered the roots of their faith. This passage is one of the several constitutive covenants in the First Testament that formed the religion of the people of Israel. Probably the most definitive of those covenants is the one made at Sinai (Exodus 19-20).
In God's covenant with Abraham and Sarah, we see the primary ingredients of an agreement that alters a relationship. God takes the initiative to confront Abraham and lays out the conditions of the agreement. Abraham's part is stated clearly: "Walk before me, and be blameless" (v. 1). Later (vv. 9-14) Abraham is ordered to practice circumcision and that is presented as both the sign and a requirement of the covenant. The rest of the assigned passage is devoted to what God promises to do. Nonetheless, there is enough required of Abraham to make this a "conditional" covenant, that is, an agreement in effect only so long as both parties do what they have agreed to do.
The context for this covenant is the whole of the Abraham and Sarah story that begins in chapter 12. Their story commences when, out of the blue, God calls the couple to pick up and move to a new land. Then amid their adventures, God confronts them again and enters into a covenant concerning the couple's descendants (15:1-21). The covenants in chapters 15 and 17 may be doublets, each coming from a different tradition. (For example, our passage is sometimes attributed to the so-called Priestly tradition and 15:1-21 to either the Elohist or the Yahwist traditions.) Our lesson comes immediately after the abortive effort to provide Abraham an offspring by means of Hagar. Therefore, the obvious question is how this couple is to become a "great nation" (12:2) when they cannot conceive even a single child.
The reading is comprised of only two parts: The covenant with Abraham (17:1-7) and with Sarah (17:15-16). What is omitted are the elaborate instructions about circumcision as a feature of the covenant relationship (vv. 8-14) and Abraham's response to God's promise concerning Sarah (vv. 17-27). Within the reading the major themes are the covenant itself, the promise of descendants and international prominence, and the giving of new names.
The making of the covenant is entirely a result of God's initiative and utter dependence on what God will do. God is identified as God Almighty (El Shaddai in the Hebrew), so that there will be no confusing this God with others. The covenant is entirely verbal, that is, God makes a covenant with Abraham and Sarah simply through speaking. Furthermore, the agreement carries over to all the couple's descendants ("between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout the generations," v. 7), so that the covenant has no time limit.
Certainly the most prominent feature of the passage is the promise of descendants and international prominence. In effect, God says the same thing over and over again in only slightly different words. To summarize all of this, Abraham and Sarah are promised numerous progeny that become a myriad of famous and influential nations. This promise comprises the heart of the covenant. God pledges to bring all this to reality, in spite of how unlikely it may seem. But there is more to the promise: The couple's offspring will include kings. What a promise! Yet without promise there is no covenant.
That promise in the covenant makes Abraham and Sarah different people. Therefore each is given a new name. In Hebraic thought, name constituted being; nothing existed without a name (see Genesis 2:4b-20). Possessing God's promise changes basic identity, and Abram and Sarai are not the same people they were before. We might compare it to the adoption of a child. With formal adoption, the child takes the surname of her or his new parents. Rightly so, because with the adoption the child begins an entirely new life and is a new person.
What a promise it is they are asked to believe! An elderly childless couple who has already exhausted all their resources in an effort to conceive! They are now asked to believe they will have offspring so numerous as to provide the foundation for entirely new nations. The reading concludes before the narrative records Abraham's utter disbelief. In verse 17 he rolls on the ground in laughter at the thought that Sarah will give birth to nations. Later when Sarah hears the promise, she too laughs (18:9-15). It is a laughable, hilarious promise, so incredible that it sounds ridiculous. Yet the couple is asked to believe it -- asked to believe the unbelievable.
Romans 4:13-25
Paul uses Abraham and Sarah as the example of what he means by justification by God's grace (3:21-26). His motive for doing so is transparent. The founders of the Hebraic tradition had their faith "reckoned" as righteousness. So, Paul's view of God's justification is not some wildly novel invention but the core of the witness of the Hebrew Scriptures. It is not easy to understand fully what Paul always has in mind, but his primary point is crystal clear.
Chapter 4 begins with Paul's claim that Abraham was not justified by works but by faith and specifically made right with God before circumcision (vv. 1-12). The lesson itself begins with Paul's continuation of his main point and constitutes the conclusion of the argument begun in 4:1. Here, however, he wants to show that inheritance of the promise made to Abraham and Sarah was not contingent on works. The nations that come from this couple are related to God through faith because they inherit the promise God made to Abraham and Sarah. Our ancestors believed God's promise, and that belief (not any works they accomplished) was what made them acceptable to God. Their story is, therefore, the model of faith for all people.
The process of Paul's thought is a bit difficult to follow, but it seems to go something like this: If Law is the basis of relationship with God, then the divine promise has no value for us since it depends on works and not faith (vv. 3-15). However, since the promise depends on faith, it is accessible for all people (that is, both Jew and Gentile -- vv. 16-17). Abraham's faith was steadfast "hoping against hope" (vv. 15-21). Therefore, God regarded Abraham's faith as righteousness and now regards our faith in the same way (vv. 22-25).
Paul's commentary on the first lesson is understandable only if we have some sense of how he is using certain key words. The first of those is "righteousness." In this discussion, Paul seems to use this word to designate a right relationship with God and not simply a good moral life. God's righteousness is revealed in Christ. That means that in Christ we learn the divine intent to bring all humanity into relationship with their Creator (see 3:21). So, to be "justified" (that is, to be "made righteous") is to be brought into a right relationship with God. The right relationship entails being forgiven and declared righteous by God. The final term we need to understand is the one translated "reckoned" (vv. 22-24). The Greek word (logizomai) may be translated to reckon, to count, or to esteem. Paul's use of the word arises from his quotation of Genesis 15:6. The simplest way of understanding this is to say that God regarded faith (looked on faith, counted faith) as an indication of a right relationship.
Paul says Abraham and Sarah exhibited a radical kind of trust in relationship to God's promises. That kind of utter and absolute trust (which is the equivalent of faith) is our means of appropriating God's grace-filled act on our behalf. God accepts our faith in Christ, his death and resurrection, as a sign of our relationship with God (vv. 23-25).
To move out of Paul's thick and sometimes confusing theological language, we might put it this way. In Christ God makes a promise to us. It is a promise of love and intimacy with our Creator, the source of all life. God asks only that we believe the promise, trust it to be true and vital for our lives. We might compare it to parents promising their child they will always love them regardless of their behavior. They ask their child only to trust that promise and thereby live within the context of love and acceptance.
However, the promise seems incredible! Certainly there is something more that we must do! Surely God wants us to live good lives and, if we don't, will reject us. Certainly, we must go to church, pray, read our Bibles, and all the rest in order to win God's approval. But no! God's promise is not a conditional one. It does not lose its validity as a result of anything we do. How incredible that all God would ask of us is to trust this crazy promise. In this case trust is believing the unbelievable.
Mark 8:31-38
God's promise is as incredible as Jesus' teachings in this lesson. These verses are a continuation of Peter's declaration that Jesus is the Christ (vv. 27-30) and a prelude to the transfiguration story. It has two parts. In verses 31-33, in response to Peter's confession, Jesus predicts his death and resurrection, and a discussion of that prediction ensues between Jesus and Peter. In the second part of the reading, Jesus teaches the crowd the implications of his forthcoming suffering for discipleship (vv. 34-38).
The predictions of the passion in the Synoptic Gospels have several functions. On the purely literary level, they increase the suspense of the story as the reader wonders when and how this is going to happen. On a theological level, they indicate that Jesus' destiny was no surprise, that the cross was no distraction from and contradiction to what he intended to do, and that he accepted it. In this particular case, the prediction includes suffering, rejection, death, and resurrection. Jesus intentionally changes the language used by Peter and does not speak of himself as Messiah but as "Son of Man." He defines his own identity and refuses to fit any preconceived molds. The events are necessary ("must") because they fulfill some divine plan. The phrase "after three days" indicates that God would quickly raise Jesus to vindicate divine justice. As a whole, Jesus' words are a radical retort to Peter and his expectations. Jesus wants to be sure that Peter and the other disciples do not pigeonhole him as a certain sort of messiah.
The discussion with Peter ensues naturally, since Jesus' prediction seems to be a response to Peter's confession. Jesus has spoken plainly, so the disciples would have no doubt what he meant. Peter, however, is scandalized by such a prediction. Surely, God's agent for Israel's redemption would not end up like this! He "rebukes" Jesus, and then Jesus "rebukes" him. We have here a sort of reciprocal and mutual rebuking. The word "rebuke" is not accidently the same one Jesus uses to call out demons and unclean spirits (for example, see 1:25). Jesus and Peter each think the other is possessed by a demon! Jesus specifies what Peter's demon is. He calls Peter "Satan." Peter, who seems to have finally gotten it right by confessing Jesus is Messiah, is now equated with the forces of evil. He is thinking the way humans are inclined to think, in this case, in terms of power and glory.
The teachings concerning discipleship (vv. 34-38) draw the implications of Jesus' destiny for his followers. The first words (v. 34) are the prerequisite for discipleship and the general principle for it. We need to shift our attention away from ourselves, carry our own cross, and go the way Jesus leads us. "Cross" in this case surely means a literal cross. It is not used figuratively for some hardship or difficulty we might have. The disciples can expect to be crucified as their master was.
Jesus goes on to elaborate this general principle with four sentences each beginning with "for" (vv. 35, 36, 37, and 38). (The RSV translates "for" in each case, while the NRSV does not.) The elaboration demonstrates that there is a logic in all of this. Surrendering one's life in favor of the gospel message is the only way of gaining genuine and full life. This topsy-turvy view of life is the only value there is. All other so-called treasures are but distractions from what our existence is all about.
The final verse puts this sacrificial understanding of life in terms of a final assessment. "If you don't have the courage to believe in me now, then I will not be able to recognize you in the last day." The shame of which Jesus speaks has already been modeled for us in Peter's response to Jesus' prediction. It means to be scandalized, to be utterly embarrassed, and to reject it out of hand. Verse 1 of chapter 9 is the conclusion to this discourse and adds an urgency to the whole matter.
If we are honest, we see something of ourselves in Peter and his response to Jesus. It is incredible and indeed scandalous that God would accomplish human redemption through one who suffers and dies and must be rescued from death. The kind of life described here is just the opposite of the one that seems to make sense. Are we to believe that power is found in weakness, that suffering exhibits glory, and that surrendering life is the only way to live fully? That's asking us to believe the unbelievable.
Our lessons all come down to this point. What Christ asks of us is inconceivable. The Christian faith amounts to "hoping against hope," as Paul puts it, or believing that which does not seem worthy of our belief. To believe the unbelievable is to surrender our lives. We give up claim to rationality, to reason, and even to our own perception of reality. It is to say, in effect, that we can know or do nothing on our own. We junk our own pride and scrap our accom-plishments to trust a promise that exceeds the reaches of our mind. Hence, as a belief of the unbelievable, Christian faith is always a counter-cultural movement. It stands opposed to all our culture values and teaches us to value. There is every reason to be ashamed of Christ and to be scandalized by the gospel. Yet God's promise in Christ draws an unexplainable faith out of us, so that we end up believing the unbelievable.
Mark 9:2-9
See the discussion of this passage in our column for Transfiguration Sunday. The message of transfiguration story fits the theme of believing the unbelievable like a glove. It poses glory in the context of suffering, which is where the Gospel lesson for Transfiguration Sunday leads us. If Christ's glory is found only in the cross, then we have something incredible before us. Power and glory are turned upside down, even as they are in 8:30-38.
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16
We come in this passage to the Priestly version of God's promise to Abraham of a son. Just as we have four different accounts in the gospels of the life of Jesus, so in the Old Testament we sometimes have differing accounts of the lives of some of the leading Old Testament characters. And usually there are several accounts given because the person or event is so important in Israel's history. Such is the case of a promise of a son to Abraham and Sarah, the forebears of Israel. Genesis 12 and 18 record the J account of the promise. Genesis 15 comes from E, the Elohist. And this chapter stems from Priestly tradition. But each version agrees on the principal message. In the spring of the year, Sarah, the wife of Abraham, will give birth to an heir.
We are told in our text that Abraham is 99 years old when the promise is given, and Sarah is ninety (vv. 1, 17), but this story is not intended simply as a miracle tale. Rather it has to do with the universal purpose of God, as all of the biblical stories ultimately have to do with that purpose.
We are told in the scriptures that the Lord God created the earth good, full of life and running over with abundance. But we human beings, in our attempts to run our own lives and to make God unnecessary, have corrupted God's good creation and brought discord and death into all the world. As a result, the purpose of the Lord, according to the Bible, is to restore his creation to the goodness that he intended for it in the beginning. And to do that, God sets out to make a people, a new community, that knows how to live faithfully under his lordship in justice and righteousness and peace. It is God's intention, then, to draw all the families of the earth into that community and thus to establish his rule over all flesh, so that they know the blessings of abundant life in their fullness. God wants to make a new people in order that, through that people, he may bring his blessing on all people (cf. Genesis 12:3).
Whom does he choose to be the beginning of that new community of faith? He chooses Abraham and Sarah, semites of about the eighteenth century B.C., who at God's command, have abandoned their home in Mesopotamia and journeyed to the land of Canaan. From that aged couple God will bring forth a son named Isaac, who in turn will be the father of Jacob, and from whom then will issue forth the twelve forbears of the twelve tribes of Israel. Those people of Israel will be set apart to serve God's purpose as his "holy nation." They will mediate the knowledge of God to all the world as God's "kingdom of priests." And they will be the witnesses to God's working in human history, so that finally every nation will acknowledge God's lordship and praise and serve him as their God. Such is the purpose of the Lord according to the scriptures.
But why should God choose the people of Israel to be his special people? Some folks are very offended by the fact that Israel is the chosen people. As in the little poem by Ogden Nash: "How odd of God to choose the Jews." But the poem goes on: "Oh no it's not. God knows what's what." And indeed, God does. God chooses Israel because when he picks them out, they are no people. As Deuteronomy 7:7 states, "It was not because you were more in number than any other people ... for you were the fewest of all peoples." The Israelites were not a great nation like the Egyptians or Hittites of the time. In fact, they were just a ragged bunch of slaves, toiling in the mudpits of Egypt, when God chose them. And so you see, they could claim nothing for themselves. They could not say, "We were chosen because we were so great and deserved it." Rather, they had to confess that they were nothing, and that God's election of them was solely an act of loving grace on his part, totally undeserved and unearned.
And the same is true with God's choice of Abraham and Sarah. When God gives them a son to make them the forbears of the populous nation of Israel, the couple are not self-made candidates for the job -- not healthy twenty-year-olds who can easily conceive a child. They're in their nineties! They're past the age when people have babies! They also are not persons with great faith who deserve the special attention of God. In the verse immediately following our text for the morning, Abraham falls on his face and laughs when God tells him he will have a son (v. 17). And if you go on to chapter 18 in Genesis, Sarah laughs too (Genesis 18:12).
So you see, we are given to understand that the gift of a child, the birth of Isaac, is entirely God's work, and he alone is the one who is to be praised for such a fantastic development. God is the principal actor in all of these stories in the Bible, and everything he does is driving toward the fulfillment of that promise he has made to bring his blessing on all the peoples of the earth through Israel. God's love is doing the miraculous work of restoring his creation to the goodness that he wants for it. His love presses forward in these stories -- his overwhelming love that can overcome every obstacle to the fulfillment of his intention to save us all.
Do you realize that God is working in your life and mine in the same way? God wants to save us. He wants the abundant life for us that he intended for us in the beginning. And he is at work in our hearts and minds despite every obstacle -- despite our faithlessness, our wrongdoing, our indifference toward him, and our terrible, terrible ignorance of his character. Indeed, so ready is God to fulfill his purpose for our lives that he has even sent his beloved Son to die for us -- all because he loves us! "God so loved the world...!" You and me, your neighbor, your enemy, and all that host of humanity that has preceded us since the time of Abraham and that will follow us until God's kingdom comes. God loves! God loves the world! And the final proof of that love is his love in Jesus Christ.
More than that, good Christians, God has elected us too, like he elected Israel, to be his holy nation and kingdom of priests, and to mediate the knowledge of his love to all the world. He's still trying to make a new community, you see. He's still trying to fashion a people who knows how to live under his lordship in justice and righteousness and peace. Now that community is called the Christian Church, the new Israel in Jesus Christ. And God still wants us to draw all people into that community, that he may be all in all and that his rule may be confessed throughout the world. Well, the Lord God gave Sarah and Abraham a son when they were old and past the age of childbearing. It just may be that he can work an equal miracle in us, his church, if in faith we will let him.
