The long and winding road
Commentary
The "journey" is a favorite image for spiritual growth. It fits the subject in so many ways. A journey has a definite starting point and a definite ending point. However, to be on the road -- especially for the first time -- is an adventure. For while you know where you are going, you don't know the sights along the way. To say that you are "on the journey" is particularly appropriate for a religious quest, because it is an admission that you have not yet "arrived." The quest, while definite, is ongoing. Christians believe that the quest is never finished in this life, and yet the goal is clear and definite, embodied in the life of Christ himself.
The image of the journey is fundamental to biblical literature. One could say that even God stepped out on a journey, in calming the waters of chaos and setting the universe in motion. Adam was forced out of paradise and on to the road, east of Eden. Cain was set out on the road even further to the east, "a fugitive and wanderer on the earth" (Genesis 4:14). Noah took a journey across the waters. The people of Babel scattered "abroad over the face of all the earth" (Genesis 11:9). Abraham journeyed from Ur of the Chaldees to the land of Haran to Canaan, with a side trip to Egypt. Isaac went back to Haran for a wife, as did Jacob. Joseph took the entire clan into Egypt again, while Moses brought them back out. The people would settle in the land, only to be displaced as exiles in Babylon, but eventually to return to the land promised to Abraham. The examples could be multiplied through the rest of the Hebrew Bible and on into the New Testament.
In Isaiah, God's people are prophesied to make a pilgrimage on a holy highway. But when will this final journey take place? James asks us to be patient as we look for the goal of our journey. Matthew adds that the sights along the way should convince us that we are on the right path.
Isaiah 35:1-10
Once at the dinner table, I was trying to impress a visitor with tales of our disastrous family vacations. As I exaggerated, caricatured, and otherwise indulged in excessive hyperbole, my collective audience (most of whom had been on said trips) rolled in the aisles with laughter. All except my father, who sat stoically through the whole thing, then delivered the final punch line: "Don't let him kid you -- it was never that much fun."
Usually, we tell tales about the odd, quirky, and funny things that happen on trips. In an adventure, something has to go wrong or be unusual. It would be a bland road story, indeed, in which nothing happened. But Isaiah expects us to be fascinated with just such a tale of smooth passage! On the road that Isaiah describes, there will be no predators: "No lion shall be there, nor shall any ravenous beast come up on it" (Isaiah 35:9). There is no need for a roadmap; no one shall get lost along the way, "not even fools" (v. 8). Not much chance of adventure on such a road; there would seem to be no story here.
But, in fact, this non-adventure will set all of creation singing. "The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing" (Isaiah 35:1-2). The "crocus" (havatselet) or colchicum plant, also known as meadow saffron, produces dark green leaves and bright purple flowers, and is quite beautiful (and deadly poisonous as well). To fill a desert with such flowers would be to turn sand into a forest, and indeed Isaiah promises to give the wilderness "the glory of Lebanon," which was known for its cedars. Such a transformation would require an immense irrigation project, which God provides: "For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes" (vv. 6-7). Thus the journey is not entirely uneventful after all, since it follows the transformation of the created order.
Human transformation is also in view on this journey, which turns out to lack not adventure, but only misadventure. Weak hands and feeble knees are strengthened for the journey (v. 3). Physical handicaps are fixed: "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy" (vv. 5-6). Most importantly, any inner inhibitions about the journey are to be removed: "Say to those who are of a fearful heart, 'Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God' " (v. 4).
Finally we come to the journey itself, the purpose behind this reconfiguration of road, desert, and humanity: "And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away" (v. 10). "The ransomed of the Lord," like "the redeemed" (v. 9), refers to people who have been bought out of slavery or debt, God having paid the price of their redemption. This is why they sing along the way; they have been freed of an onerous burden. They embark on an exclusive path, being the only travelers on the highway called "the Holy Way" (v. 8), where "the unclean shall not travel" (for example, only those whom God has redeemed are on this journey).
Obviously, this section owes no little inspiration to Israel's experience of exile and return from Babylon; most scholars see Isaiah 35 as an anticipation of the great themes of the restoration and rejuvenation of Israel after exile, found in Second Isaiah (chs. 40-55). However, this prophetic announcement of salvation looks beyond Babylon to a more perfect and lasting human restoration. The desert needs no human help to flourish, and it produces not crops for food, but flowers for their beauty. The people on God's holy highway are both metaphorically and literally free from physical and moral defects. The perils that might turn a good road story into a tragedy are entirely missing. This is indeed a vision of paradise.
James 5:7-10
But what if the journey is so long that you can hardly remember how you got to your present position? A good road story is made up of a series of interesting anecdotes, but if there is no broader arc to the story, all you have are anecdotes. If it goes on seemingly forever, how can you make sense of the story? The Epistle of James addresses the situation of travelers who can't remember back to the beginning, and despair of ever seeing the end.
The solution, James says, is patience. "Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord" (James 5:7). The end of the journey, in Christian theology, is the final coming of Christ to rule the heavens and the earth. In the meantime, the community is required to wait. Waiting is best done with "patience." Children may squirm in their seats, constantly asking, "Are we there yet?" The mature Christian knows that the timetable belongs to God.
James gives two examples of patience. The first is a proverb of sorts: "The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth, being patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains" (v. 7). The image of the farmer was a common one (cf. Matthew 13:1-9; 1 Corinthians 9:7, 10; 2 Timothy 2:6). In this case, the point of contact is the farmer's confidence that the unseen seed will eventually sprout into crops, given the proper care (the reference to the "early and late rains" reflects the agricultural conditions of Syria and Palestine). The farmer's example should lead the Christians to focus their energy: "Strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near" (v. 8). The nearness of the Judge should warn us against taking our uncertainty out on other members of the community (v. 9).
The second example of patience is the prophets of the Hebrew Bible, here taken to include Job (vv. 10-11). As before in his letter, James offers a moral example to his readers (cf. 1:22-25; 2:20-25; 5:17-18). The "suffering and patience" of the prophets was proverbial (cf. 2 Chronicles 24:20-21; Jeremiah 26:20-23; Matthew 5:12; Luke 6:23; 11:49-51). Job may seem like an odd example, both as a "prophet" and a patient man, but again his patience was proverbial in James' day (being documented in The Testament of Job). However, he argued with God, he did not turn his frustration on his friends; so, too, Christians should treat each other with respect as they await "the purpose of the Lord" (v. 11).
This passage moves the argument of the Epistle toward its final conclusion in 5:12-20. James has turned away from his condemnation of the rich oppressors (5:1-6) to a more positive and reassuring exhortation to the community of the faithful. In order to avoid the alienation from God and humanity that James blames on the oppressors, the Christian community must find a different way of living in the world. This life will regard patience as one of its chief virtues. It is the same as trust in God. If we try to find our own way in life, we are sure to be lost. Walking down God's path requires that we trust that God knows the way, even if we can't see the end of the road from here.
Matthew 11:2-11
One of the more perplexing problems for early Christians was how to handle John the Baptist. Apparently, there was still a small band of Baptist disciples running around in the early days of Christianity (cf. Acts 18:24-28; 19:1-7; Matthew 11:2). Were they friends or enemies? Another religion, or incomplete Christians? Part of the problem was that the Christians didn't know exactly what to make of John the Baptist. Was he the prophet who would come in the spirit and power of Elijah? (John said, "No," Matthew said, "Yes.") What were Christians to make of his baptism of Jesus, if Jesus were the one in the superior position?
Matthew deals with the issue in part by reversing it: The question was not what Christians were to make of John, but what John was to make of Jesus. Matthew makes his own position clear from the outset, for he pictures John as hearing about "the deeds of the Messiah" (Matthew 11:2, author's translation). There is no doubt for Matthew that Jesus is the Messiah, and John is the one who is in confusion: "Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?" (v. 3).
Jesus, for his part, is not going to give John a straight answer, but allows him to draw his own conclusion. He quotes from Isaiah's vision of the final journey: "the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them" (v. 5). Matthew actually uses Isaiah to recap the story so far, in which the blind have been cured (9:27-31), the lame have walked (8:5-13; 9:2-8), the lepers have been made clean (8:1-4; this is an addition to the Isaiah citation), the deaf have been given their ears (9:32-34), the dead have been raised (9:18-26; another addition to the citation), and the poor have had good news preached to them (11:1; 4:23; 5:3). Matthew has already shown that Jesus has done "the deeds of the Messiah" as foretold by the prophets; he has inaugurated the kingdom of heaven, for all who have eyes to see. Matthew adds a gentle beatitude aimed at the Baptist and his disciples: "Blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me" (v. 6). The issue is not whether the ministry of John the Baptist should be a stumbling block for Christians, but whether those attracted to the message of the Baptist can come to understand his place in the larger scheme of things.
Matthew goes on to outline John's position, as Jesus addresses the crowds on the subject. They had come to John before Jesus even began his ministry, but why? "What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind?" (v. 7). There were tall grasses growing near the Jordan where John baptized -- it was an everyday sight. Did they go out to see the same old, same old? No -- not any more than they went out to see kings dressed in soft robes (v. 8; remember that John's raiment has already been described, 3:4). John's dress, his location, his manner, and his message all identified him as a prophet (v. 9). But he was more than that, for scripture foretold him as the messenger who would prepare God's way (v. 10, quoting Malachi 3:1). John was the greatest of all the prophets that had gone before him, but so great was his mission, that in the kingdom to come, he would be nothing special (v. 11). Matthew goes on to say that John held the prophetic office of Elijah, whose coming was said to herald the Day of the Lord (Malachi 4:5-6). Matthew does not mean that Elijah is reincarnated in John (such a notion was foreign to Hellenistic Judaism, which considered Elijah to have been taken up into heaven without dying), but that John acted "in the spirit and power of Elijah" as the Messiah's forerunner (Luke 1:17).
Application
Faith is a journey. It may never fully reach its goal, but it does have a goal. James speaks of "the purpose of the Lord," which could be translated "the goal which is the Lord." God's goal for us is found in Jesus himself.
Another way of saying this is that Christianity is a journey toward maturity, the example of which is found in Jesus Christ. The New Testament word for "maturity" (teleiotes, adjective teleios) is built on the same root as the word "goal" (telos); to be mature is to reach a particular goal. In the book of Hebrews, for example, the hearers are compared to infants in need of milk, not solid food -- basic teaching, not advanced -- for "solid food is for the mature (teleios), for those whose faculties have been trained by practice to distinguish good and evil" (Hebrews 5:14). The next verse extends the contrast between baby food and steak: "Therefore let us go on toward maturity (teleiotes), leaving behind the basic teaching about Christ, and not laying again the foundation" (Hebrews 6:1, author's translation). Maturity here is a sense of spiritual growth that moves beyond the basics -- not strained carrots from a jar, but an adult meal on a plate.
Paul uses the same image in the case of the Corinthians, calling them infants who need milk and not solid food (1 Corinthians 3:1-2). He explicitly contrasts this basic teaching with what he would give to "spiritual people" (3:1): "Among the mature (again, teleios) we do speak wisdom" (2:6). Later, he exhorts them, "Do not be children in your thinking: rather, be infants in evil, but in thinking be adults (or "mature," since again the word is teleios)" (14:20). Paul even goes so far as to say of mature Christians, "we have the mind of Christ" (3:14).
Thus, Christ himself is the standard of Christian maturity. To say "we have the mind of Christ" is not to say that we always think like Jesus, but that Jesus is the standard by which we measure our thinking. This is most clear in the Letter to the Ephesians, which describes the various gifts given to Christians by Christ, for the eventual purpose of maturity, "until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity (teleios), to the measure of the full stature of Christ" (Ephesians 4:13). The metaphor of maturity, physical growth to adulthood, is applied explicitly to the "full stature of Christ" as our point of comparison. We grow to Christ's size. Maturity is given an intellectual component consisting of "the faith and knowledge of the Son of God." In other words, maturity involves knowing Jesus well enough to think like him, to "have the mind of Christ."
Thus, it is not so much "What would Jesus do?" but "What would Jesus think?" (cf. Philippians 2:1-11; 3:12-15). The journey ahead of us asks us to take on Jesus' way of looking at things. As we have already seen, it involves opening our eyes to the ways God is transforming creation for our benefit, as the "deeds of the Messiah" are done around us and by us (cf. John 14:12).
Alternative Applications
1) Isaiah 35:1-10; James 5:7-10; Matthew 11:2-11.
When Isaiah exhorts his audience to "strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees," these verbs are plural in form -- that is, the exhortation is given not to an individual but a community (Isaiah 35:3). James exhorts his hearers to strengthen not hands but hearts (James 5:8); the Greek term "heart" referred to intention rather than emotion, so the commandment was to try to help focus each other's resolves -- again, a communal activity. So, too, Jesus exhorts John and his disciples not to take "offense" (Matthew 11:6). In all these cases, the spotlight is not on the individual but on the group. Further, all these passages deal with the end times, and in that context concentrate not on the details of salvation, nor those of judgment itself, but the moral implication that people of faith should reconsider their interpersonal relations in light of the nearness of the Day of the Lord. Would that modern eschatologists, who take such glee in describing the imminent destruction of their enemies, would take James' exhortation to heart.
2) Matthew 11:2-11.
"Among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he" (Matthew 2:11). Matthew does not say that John was not part of the kingdom, only that he represented a turning point. The kingdom that Jesus was establishing was so great that it could not be measured by any previous standard. It was the threshold of a new age. No Christian should become arrogant, however, thinking oneself to be greater than John the Baptist. Jesus makes it clear that in his kingdom, the last will be first, the first last, and the least will be the greatest. Again, the focus is on the community, which lives in a state of spiritual equality. The reason any believer is greater than the greatest of the prophets is that in this new kingdom, we are all raised to equal and unparalleled greatness.
Preaching The Psalm
Psalm 146:5-10
It is the words, "whose hope is in the Lord their God," (v. 5) that draws this psalm into use during Advent. The theme of hope permeates not only the Advent season, but the entirety of the gospel message. In Paul's great trilogy of what is greatest, hope is mentioned along with faith and love. And while love is the most important in the apostle's mind, hope may be the most difficult.
Part of the reason for hope's difficulty is the danger we face of confusing hoping with wishing. Hope that is genuine hope can never be fully invested in a particular outcome. Standing by the bedside of a sick child, we cannot but wish the child well and whole. But, if our hope depends on that outcome, it may not hold. Or facing the uncertainty of a personal illness, our wish is that we will survive and avoid the pain of radical treatments. But, if our hope depends on this outcome, we may find ourselves with no hope.
Hope is that which undergirds the big picture. Hope is that experience of grace, informed by faith, and enacted by commitment, that believes in a good outcome overall regardless of our particular circumstances. It is this general hope that allows us to face our losses, and our pain without sinking into despair.
And when the pain is great, hope is difficult to maintain.
That's why the psalmist correctly celebrates the origin and direction of our hope. "Happy are those ... whose hope is in the Lord their God." Hope is not in our schemes and cures. Hope is not in our technology or our ingenuity. Hope is not in some amorphous future. Our hope, if it is real hope, is in the Lord.
The psalmist is right again when he recognizes that those who are able to have their hope in the Lord are "happy." This is one of those difficult words, in Hebrew and in English, that forces us to think past our own cultural meanings. The meaning of the word "happiness" in our culture most often means having everything just like we want it to be. But the very nature of our discussion of hope dictates that this "happiness," whatever it is, is present regardless of our circumstances.
The idea of "fortunate" or "blessed" may offer some insight into the psalmist's meaning. Those people whose hope is God, those who are not knocked out by the ups and downs of life, those people are truly blessed. They are fortunate in that they have a hope that holds against the storm, and does not crumble when life gets hard.
How fortunate indeed. No wonder they are so happy.
The image of the journey is fundamental to biblical literature. One could say that even God stepped out on a journey, in calming the waters of chaos and setting the universe in motion. Adam was forced out of paradise and on to the road, east of Eden. Cain was set out on the road even further to the east, "a fugitive and wanderer on the earth" (Genesis 4:14). Noah took a journey across the waters. The people of Babel scattered "abroad over the face of all the earth" (Genesis 11:9). Abraham journeyed from Ur of the Chaldees to the land of Haran to Canaan, with a side trip to Egypt. Isaac went back to Haran for a wife, as did Jacob. Joseph took the entire clan into Egypt again, while Moses brought them back out. The people would settle in the land, only to be displaced as exiles in Babylon, but eventually to return to the land promised to Abraham. The examples could be multiplied through the rest of the Hebrew Bible and on into the New Testament.
In Isaiah, God's people are prophesied to make a pilgrimage on a holy highway. But when will this final journey take place? James asks us to be patient as we look for the goal of our journey. Matthew adds that the sights along the way should convince us that we are on the right path.
Isaiah 35:1-10
Once at the dinner table, I was trying to impress a visitor with tales of our disastrous family vacations. As I exaggerated, caricatured, and otherwise indulged in excessive hyperbole, my collective audience (most of whom had been on said trips) rolled in the aisles with laughter. All except my father, who sat stoically through the whole thing, then delivered the final punch line: "Don't let him kid you -- it was never that much fun."
Usually, we tell tales about the odd, quirky, and funny things that happen on trips. In an adventure, something has to go wrong or be unusual. It would be a bland road story, indeed, in which nothing happened. But Isaiah expects us to be fascinated with just such a tale of smooth passage! On the road that Isaiah describes, there will be no predators: "No lion shall be there, nor shall any ravenous beast come up on it" (Isaiah 35:9). There is no need for a roadmap; no one shall get lost along the way, "not even fools" (v. 8). Not much chance of adventure on such a road; there would seem to be no story here.
But, in fact, this non-adventure will set all of creation singing. "The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing" (Isaiah 35:1-2). The "crocus" (havatselet) or colchicum plant, also known as meadow saffron, produces dark green leaves and bright purple flowers, and is quite beautiful (and deadly poisonous as well). To fill a desert with such flowers would be to turn sand into a forest, and indeed Isaiah promises to give the wilderness "the glory of Lebanon," which was known for its cedars. Such a transformation would require an immense irrigation project, which God provides: "For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes" (vv. 6-7). Thus the journey is not entirely uneventful after all, since it follows the transformation of the created order.
Human transformation is also in view on this journey, which turns out to lack not adventure, but only misadventure. Weak hands and feeble knees are strengthened for the journey (v. 3). Physical handicaps are fixed: "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy" (vv. 5-6). Most importantly, any inner inhibitions about the journey are to be removed: "Say to those who are of a fearful heart, 'Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God' " (v. 4).
Finally we come to the journey itself, the purpose behind this reconfiguration of road, desert, and humanity: "And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away" (v. 10). "The ransomed of the Lord," like "the redeemed" (v. 9), refers to people who have been bought out of slavery or debt, God having paid the price of their redemption. This is why they sing along the way; they have been freed of an onerous burden. They embark on an exclusive path, being the only travelers on the highway called "the Holy Way" (v. 8), where "the unclean shall not travel" (for example, only those whom God has redeemed are on this journey).
Obviously, this section owes no little inspiration to Israel's experience of exile and return from Babylon; most scholars see Isaiah 35 as an anticipation of the great themes of the restoration and rejuvenation of Israel after exile, found in Second Isaiah (chs. 40-55). However, this prophetic announcement of salvation looks beyond Babylon to a more perfect and lasting human restoration. The desert needs no human help to flourish, and it produces not crops for food, but flowers for their beauty. The people on God's holy highway are both metaphorically and literally free from physical and moral defects. The perils that might turn a good road story into a tragedy are entirely missing. This is indeed a vision of paradise.
James 5:7-10
But what if the journey is so long that you can hardly remember how you got to your present position? A good road story is made up of a series of interesting anecdotes, but if there is no broader arc to the story, all you have are anecdotes. If it goes on seemingly forever, how can you make sense of the story? The Epistle of James addresses the situation of travelers who can't remember back to the beginning, and despair of ever seeing the end.
The solution, James says, is patience. "Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord" (James 5:7). The end of the journey, in Christian theology, is the final coming of Christ to rule the heavens and the earth. In the meantime, the community is required to wait. Waiting is best done with "patience." Children may squirm in their seats, constantly asking, "Are we there yet?" The mature Christian knows that the timetable belongs to God.
James gives two examples of patience. The first is a proverb of sorts: "The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth, being patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains" (v. 7). The image of the farmer was a common one (cf. Matthew 13:1-9; 1 Corinthians 9:7, 10; 2 Timothy 2:6). In this case, the point of contact is the farmer's confidence that the unseen seed will eventually sprout into crops, given the proper care (the reference to the "early and late rains" reflects the agricultural conditions of Syria and Palestine). The farmer's example should lead the Christians to focus their energy: "Strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near" (v. 8). The nearness of the Judge should warn us against taking our uncertainty out on other members of the community (v. 9).
The second example of patience is the prophets of the Hebrew Bible, here taken to include Job (vv. 10-11). As before in his letter, James offers a moral example to his readers (cf. 1:22-25; 2:20-25; 5:17-18). The "suffering and patience" of the prophets was proverbial (cf. 2 Chronicles 24:20-21; Jeremiah 26:20-23; Matthew 5:12; Luke 6:23; 11:49-51). Job may seem like an odd example, both as a "prophet" and a patient man, but again his patience was proverbial in James' day (being documented in The Testament of Job). However, he argued with God, he did not turn his frustration on his friends; so, too, Christians should treat each other with respect as they await "the purpose of the Lord" (v. 11).
This passage moves the argument of the Epistle toward its final conclusion in 5:12-20. James has turned away from his condemnation of the rich oppressors (5:1-6) to a more positive and reassuring exhortation to the community of the faithful. In order to avoid the alienation from God and humanity that James blames on the oppressors, the Christian community must find a different way of living in the world. This life will regard patience as one of its chief virtues. It is the same as trust in God. If we try to find our own way in life, we are sure to be lost. Walking down God's path requires that we trust that God knows the way, even if we can't see the end of the road from here.
Matthew 11:2-11
One of the more perplexing problems for early Christians was how to handle John the Baptist. Apparently, there was still a small band of Baptist disciples running around in the early days of Christianity (cf. Acts 18:24-28; 19:1-7; Matthew 11:2). Were they friends or enemies? Another religion, or incomplete Christians? Part of the problem was that the Christians didn't know exactly what to make of John the Baptist. Was he the prophet who would come in the spirit and power of Elijah? (John said, "No," Matthew said, "Yes.") What were Christians to make of his baptism of Jesus, if Jesus were the one in the superior position?
Matthew deals with the issue in part by reversing it: The question was not what Christians were to make of John, but what John was to make of Jesus. Matthew makes his own position clear from the outset, for he pictures John as hearing about "the deeds of the Messiah" (Matthew 11:2, author's translation). There is no doubt for Matthew that Jesus is the Messiah, and John is the one who is in confusion: "Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?" (v. 3).
Jesus, for his part, is not going to give John a straight answer, but allows him to draw his own conclusion. He quotes from Isaiah's vision of the final journey: "the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them" (v. 5). Matthew actually uses Isaiah to recap the story so far, in which the blind have been cured (9:27-31), the lame have walked (8:5-13; 9:2-8), the lepers have been made clean (8:1-4; this is an addition to the Isaiah citation), the deaf have been given their ears (9:32-34), the dead have been raised (9:18-26; another addition to the citation), and the poor have had good news preached to them (11:1; 4:23; 5:3). Matthew has already shown that Jesus has done "the deeds of the Messiah" as foretold by the prophets; he has inaugurated the kingdom of heaven, for all who have eyes to see. Matthew adds a gentle beatitude aimed at the Baptist and his disciples: "Blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me" (v. 6). The issue is not whether the ministry of John the Baptist should be a stumbling block for Christians, but whether those attracted to the message of the Baptist can come to understand his place in the larger scheme of things.
Matthew goes on to outline John's position, as Jesus addresses the crowds on the subject. They had come to John before Jesus even began his ministry, but why? "What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind?" (v. 7). There were tall grasses growing near the Jordan where John baptized -- it was an everyday sight. Did they go out to see the same old, same old? No -- not any more than they went out to see kings dressed in soft robes (v. 8; remember that John's raiment has already been described, 3:4). John's dress, his location, his manner, and his message all identified him as a prophet (v. 9). But he was more than that, for scripture foretold him as the messenger who would prepare God's way (v. 10, quoting Malachi 3:1). John was the greatest of all the prophets that had gone before him, but so great was his mission, that in the kingdom to come, he would be nothing special (v. 11). Matthew goes on to say that John held the prophetic office of Elijah, whose coming was said to herald the Day of the Lord (Malachi 4:5-6). Matthew does not mean that Elijah is reincarnated in John (such a notion was foreign to Hellenistic Judaism, which considered Elijah to have been taken up into heaven without dying), but that John acted "in the spirit and power of Elijah" as the Messiah's forerunner (Luke 1:17).
Application
Faith is a journey. It may never fully reach its goal, but it does have a goal. James speaks of "the purpose of the Lord," which could be translated "the goal which is the Lord." God's goal for us is found in Jesus himself.
Another way of saying this is that Christianity is a journey toward maturity, the example of which is found in Jesus Christ. The New Testament word for "maturity" (teleiotes, adjective teleios) is built on the same root as the word "goal" (telos); to be mature is to reach a particular goal. In the book of Hebrews, for example, the hearers are compared to infants in need of milk, not solid food -- basic teaching, not advanced -- for "solid food is for the mature (teleios), for those whose faculties have been trained by practice to distinguish good and evil" (Hebrews 5:14). The next verse extends the contrast between baby food and steak: "Therefore let us go on toward maturity (teleiotes), leaving behind the basic teaching about Christ, and not laying again the foundation" (Hebrews 6:1, author's translation). Maturity here is a sense of spiritual growth that moves beyond the basics -- not strained carrots from a jar, but an adult meal on a plate.
Paul uses the same image in the case of the Corinthians, calling them infants who need milk and not solid food (1 Corinthians 3:1-2). He explicitly contrasts this basic teaching with what he would give to "spiritual people" (3:1): "Among the mature (again, teleios) we do speak wisdom" (2:6). Later, he exhorts them, "Do not be children in your thinking: rather, be infants in evil, but in thinking be adults (or "mature," since again the word is teleios)" (14:20). Paul even goes so far as to say of mature Christians, "we have the mind of Christ" (3:14).
Thus, Christ himself is the standard of Christian maturity. To say "we have the mind of Christ" is not to say that we always think like Jesus, but that Jesus is the standard by which we measure our thinking. This is most clear in the Letter to the Ephesians, which describes the various gifts given to Christians by Christ, for the eventual purpose of maturity, "until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity (teleios), to the measure of the full stature of Christ" (Ephesians 4:13). The metaphor of maturity, physical growth to adulthood, is applied explicitly to the "full stature of Christ" as our point of comparison. We grow to Christ's size. Maturity is given an intellectual component consisting of "the faith and knowledge of the Son of God." In other words, maturity involves knowing Jesus well enough to think like him, to "have the mind of Christ."
Thus, it is not so much "What would Jesus do?" but "What would Jesus think?" (cf. Philippians 2:1-11; 3:12-15). The journey ahead of us asks us to take on Jesus' way of looking at things. As we have already seen, it involves opening our eyes to the ways God is transforming creation for our benefit, as the "deeds of the Messiah" are done around us and by us (cf. John 14:12).
Alternative Applications
1) Isaiah 35:1-10; James 5:7-10; Matthew 11:2-11.
When Isaiah exhorts his audience to "strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees," these verbs are plural in form -- that is, the exhortation is given not to an individual but a community (Isaiah 35:3). James exhorts his hearers to strengthen not hands but hearts (James 5:8); the Greek term "heart" referred to intention rather than emotion, so the commandment was to try to help focus each other's resolves -- again, a communal activity. So, too, Jesus exhorts John and his disciples not to take "offense" (Matthew 11:6). In all these cases, the spotlight is not on the individual but on the group. Further, all these passages deal with the end times, and in that context concentrate not on the details of salvation, nor those of judgment itself, but the moral implication that people of faith should reconsider their interpersonal relations in light of the nearness of the Day of the Lord. Would that modern eschatologists, who take such glee in describing the imminent destruction of their enemies, would take James' exhortation to heart.
2) Matthew 11:2-11.
"Among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he" (Matthew 2:11). Matthew does not say that John was not part of the kingdom, only that he represented a turning point. The kingdom that Jesus was establishing was so great that it could not be measured by any previous standard. It was the threshold of a new age. No Christian should become arrogant, however, thinking oneself to be greater than John the Baptist. Jesus makes it clear that in his kingdom, the last will be first, the first last, and the least will be the greatest. Again, the focus is on the community, which lives in a state of spiritual equality. The reason any believer is greater than the greatest of the prophets is that in this new kingdom, we are all raised to equal and unparalleled greatness.
Preaching The Psalm
Psalm 146:5-10
It is the words, "whose hope is in the Lord their God," (v. 5) that draws this psalm into use during Advent. The theme of hope permeates not only the Advent season, but the entirety of the gospel message. In Paul's great trilogy of what is greatest, hope is mentioned along with faith and love. And while love is the most important in the apostle's mind, hope may be the most difficult.
Part of the reason for hope's difficulty is the danger we face of confusing hoping with wishing. Hope that is genuine hope can never be fully invested in a particular outcome. Standing by the bedside of a sick child, we cannot but wish the child well and whole. But, if our hope depends on that outcome, it may not hold. Or facing the uncertainty of a personal illness, our wish is that we will survive and avoid the pain of radical treatments. But, if our hope depends on this outcome, we may find ourselves with no hope.
Hope is that which undergirds the big picture. Hope is that experience of grace, informed by faith, and enacted by commitment, that believes in a good outcome overall regardless of our particular circumstances. It is this general hope that allows us to face our losses, and our pain without sinking into despair.
And when the pain is great, hope is difficult to maintain.
That's why the psalmist correctly celebrates the origin and direction of our hope. "Happy are those ... whose hope is in the Lord their God." Hope is not in our schemes and cures. Hope is not in our technology or our ingenuity. Hope is not in some amorphous future. Our hope, if it is real hope, is in the Lord.
The psalmist is right again when he recognizes that those who are able to have their hope in the Lord are "happy." This is one of those difficult words, in Hebrew and in English, that forces us to think past our own cultural meanings. The meaning of the word "happiness" in our culture most often means having everything just like we want it to be. But the very nature of our discussion of hope dictates that this "happiness," whatever it is, is present regardless of our circumstances.
The idea of "fortunate" or "blessed" may offer some insight into the psalmist's meaning. Those people whose hope is God, those who are not knocked out by the ups and downs of life, those people are truly blessed. They are fortunate in that they have a hope that holds against the storm, and does not crumble when life gets hard.
How fortunate indeed. No wonder they are so happy.
