Gospel for October 29, 2023

Matthew 22:39 on the side of a railroad bridge covered in graffiti bible verses. Great Miami River just at Rice Park, Miamisburg, Ohio. Includes a bit of annotation.

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Matthew 22:34-46
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

This passage illustrates how Jesus engaged his adversaries in dialogue, and overcame their arguments with the truth.  He never backed down from a confrontation, nor did he allow himself to be baited or flattered into surrendering the truth.

Once again we find the Pharisees and the Sadducees colluding with one another. This is remarkable because they were ideological and theological adversaries, interpreting the religious and political life of the Jews in very different ways.  But they agreed on the threat posed by Jesus.  This would be like Democrats and Republicans getting together against a common enemy!

So an expert in the Mosaic law challenges Jesus to identify the greatest commandment in the law.  This was a commonplace teaching device among Jewish rabbis and their students.  Quite often, a student would ask his rabbi, “What is the sum of the law that a man can say while standing on one foot?”

Of course, in this case, the question comes freighted with hidden traps.  However Jesus answers, he risks alienating either the Pharisees or the Sadducees.  But Jesus understands the heart of the law far more deeply than his adversaries, and quotes two key laws from Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18.

These laws are linked by one common theme — love.  But Jesus sees that there are two primary directions of love.  The first direction is vertical, regarding the commandment to love God with one’s whole being:

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment.

The other direction of love is horizontal, toward one’s neighbor:

A second likewise is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.

This is a brilliant summary of all 616 laws encoded in the Torah (the first five books of the Bible).  If one loves God and neighbor, then he will obey all the law and the prophets.

Incidentally, the Pharisees accept as part of the scriptures all of what we today consider the Old Testament — the law, the prophets, and the wisdom writings. These are thirty-nine books in all. The Sadducees accepted only the first five books of the Bible (which are called the Torah).

Jesus then turns the table on the Pharisees, knowing that the Pharisees accept the Psalms as part of the Word of God, which the Sadducees do not.  He questions their interpretation of Psalm 110, in which David speaks of the Messiah as his Lord.  Since they believe that the Messiah will be the ideal king and the heir of David, Jesus is asking a very simple question:

If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?

In other words, how can the Messiah be the descendent of David if David calls the Messiah his Lord? This presents a logical conundrum.

Jesus is not necessarily denying his own genealogical descent from David, which is supported by the genealogies in Matthew and Luke’s Gospels, and is also attested elsewhere.  But he may be alluding to his own preexistence as the Son of God. This is how he seems to interpret the Psalm:

The Lord said to my Lord,
sit on my right hand,
until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet

The answer can only be a matter of “both/and.”  Jesus is the preexistent Lord, who is the Second Person of the Trinity and the Son of God — and he is the descendant of David.  Jesus is fully God and fully human.

The Pharisees are confounded by his interpretation of this text, and are left speechless. They simply don’t have the theological depth to grasp what Jesus is implying.

APPLY:  

The application of the first half of this passage seems absolutely simple, and yet absolutely difficult.  It seems so simple to say, “Just love God, and love your neighbor, and you will de facto obey all of the commandments. You will worship God with all your heart, soul and mind; you will be kind to your neighbor.”

But the practice is a different matter.  It requires more than human will; it requires divine intervention.  As Saint Augustine said, “Command what you will, O Lord, and then give what you command.”

But if we make that our aim — to love God with all our being, to love neighbor as ourselves — we will be God’s obedient children.

It is very instructive to remember that love is not just kind feelings — love is grace in action.  As Eliza Doolittle says to a suitor in My Fair Lady, “Don’t talk of love, don’t talk at all; show me.”

RESPOND: 

Love means complete surrender to the other, and willingness to exert oneself for the other.  To me this means that my prayers, my worship, my daily life and business all have the same theme — a love that reaches up to God in earnest yearning, and a love that reaches out to others that their lives might also reach up toward God.  This is truly loving neighbor as myself.

Our Lord, the whole point of studying your Word isn’t so that I can impress others, or “catch” someone in an inconsistency to make me look smart.  The whole point is so that I can know you and love you — and if I do that I will also love all people because you also love all people.  Bring my life into harmony with your love, I pray.  Amen. 

PHOTOS:
"matthew 22:39" by vistavision is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

Gospel for October 25, 2020

Matthew 22:39 on the side of a railroad bridge covered in graffiti bible verses. Great Miami River just at Rice Park, Miamisburg, Ohio. Inclues a bit of annotation.

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Matthew 22:34-46
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

This passage illustrates how Jesus engaged his adversaries in dialogue, and overcame their arguments with the truth.  He never backed down from a confrontation,  nor did he allow himself to be baited or flattered into surrendering the truth.

Once again we find the Pharisees and the Sadducees colluding with one another. This is remarkable because they were ideological and theological adversaries, interpreting the religious and political life of the Jews in very different ways.  But they agreed on the threat posed by Jesus.  This would be like Democrats and Republicans getting together against a common enemy!

So an expert in the Mosaic law challenges Jesus to identify the greatest commandment in the law.  This was a commonplace teaching device among Jewish rabbis and their students.  Quite often, a student would ask his rabbi, “What is the sum of the law that a man can say while standing on one foot?”

Of course, in this case, the question comes freighted with hidden traps.  However Jesus answers, he risks alienating either the Pharisees or the Sadducees.  But Jesus understands the heart of the law far more deeply than his adversaries, and quotes two key laws from Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18.

These laws are linked by one common theme — love.  But Jesus sees that there are two primary directions of love.  The first direction is vertical, regarding the commandment to love God with one’s whole being:

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment.

The other direction of love is horizontal, toward one’s neighbor:

A second likewise is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.

This is a brilliant summary of all 616 laws encoded in the Torah (the first five books of the Bible).  If one loves God and neighbor, then he will obey all the law and the prophets.

Incidentally, the Pharisees accept as part of the scriptures all of what we today consider the Old Testament — the law, the prophets, and the wisdom writings. These are thirty-nine books in all. The Sadducees accepted only the first five books of the Bible (which are called the Torah).

Jesus then turns the table on the Pharisees, knowing that the Pharisees accept the Psalms as part of the Word of God, which the Sadducees do not.  He questions their interpretation of Psalm 110, in which David speaks of the Messiah as his Lord.  Since they believe that the Messiah will be the ideal king and the heir of David, Jesus is asking a very simple question:

If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?

In other words, how can the Messiah be the descendent of David if David calls the Messiah his Lord? This presents a logical conundrum.

Jesus is not necessarily denying his own genealogical descent from David, which is supported by the genealogies in Matthew and Luke’s Gospels, and is also attested elsewhere.  But he may be alluding to his own preexistence as the Son of God. This is how he seems to interpret the Psalm:

The Lord said to my Lord,
sit on my right hand,
until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet

The answer can only be a matter of “both/and.”  Jesus is the preexistent Lord, who is the Second Person of the Trinity and the Son of God — and he is the descendant of David.  Jesus is fully God and fully human.

The Pharisees are confounded by his interpretation of this text, and are left speechless. They simply don’t have the theological depth to grasp what Jesus is implying.

APPLY:  

The application of the first half of this passage seems absolutely simple, and yet absolutely difficult.  It seems so simple to say, “Just love God, and love your neighbor, and you will de facto obey all of the commandments. You will worship God with all your heart, soul and mind; you will be kind to your neighbor.”

But the practice is a different matter.  It requires more than human will; it requires divine intervention.  As Saint Augustine said, “Command what you will, O Lord, and then give what you command.”

But if we make that our aim — to love God with all our being, to love neighbor as ourselves — we will be God’s obedient children.

It is very instructive to remember that love is not just kind feelings — love is grace in action.  As Eliza Doolittle says to a suitor in My Fair Lady, “Don’t talk of love, don’t talk at all; show me.”

RESPOND: 

Love means complete surrender to the other, and willingness to exert oneself for the other.  To me this means that my prayers, my worship, my daily life and business all have the same theme — a love that reaches up to God in earnest yearning, and a love that reaches out to others that their lives might also reach up toward God.  This is truly loving neighbor as myself.

Our Lord, the whole point of studying your Word isn’t so that I can impress others, or “catch” someone in an inconsistency to make me look smart.  The whole point is so that I can know you and love you — and if I do that I will also love all people because you also love all people.  Bring my life into harmony with your love, I pray.  Amen. 

PHOTOS:
"matthew 22:39" by vistavision is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

Epistle for April 5, 2020 (Liturgy of the Passion)

Note from Celeste:

Before we look at today’s lectionary reading, I’d like to draw your attention to my Holy Week Bible Study book.

Go and Find a Donkey is the latest installment of the Choose This Day Multiple Choice Bible Studies series.

The daily devotionals take 10-15 minutes and include:

• Scripture passage (World English Bible)
• Fun, entertaining multiple choice questions focused directly on the Scripture passage
• Short meditation that can be used as a discussion starter.

Use them on the suggested dates, or skip around.  Designed to be used during Holy Week, this nine-day Bible study takes you from Palm Sunday through Easter Monday.

Use this book personally during a coffee break or with the family in the car or at the breakfast table.

Order Go and Find a Donkey  today to prepare your family for this year’s Easter season!
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Kindle book of Go and Find a Donkey.
CLICK HERE for Amazon’s Paperback of Go and Find a Donkey.

AND NOW, BACK TO TODAY’S LECTIONARY READING:

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Philippians 2:5-11
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

This passage is one of the clearest and most concise statements in the New Testament about the nature and work of Christ. This passage is believed by some to be part of an early Christian hymn.

The Apostle Paul anticipates the Nicene Creed which was written 300 years later.  The Nicene Creed says that Jesus is:

the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God….
…. for us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary and became truly human.

Paul rehearses what is called the kerygma (i.e., the proclamation of the saving work of Jesus Christ)  about what Christ has done:

• He has come to earth for us, though he was preexistent and equal with God.
• He has been perfectly obedient by accepting death on the cross.
• He has been exalted to the highest place with God the Father.

Paul begins with an exhortation to the Philippians that they are to imitate Christ:

Have this in your mind, which was also in Christ Jesus

The theme of the “imitation of Christ” appears repeatedly throughout the New Testament, not least when Jesus tells his disciples:

Whoever wants to come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. (Mark 8:34).

Paul unpacks his exhortation to have the mind of Christ by exploring the character and ministry of Jesus.

First, Paul’s doctrine supports the doctrine established in the Gospel of John, that Jesus is the preexistent Son of God, and that he is divine.  However, Paul tells us that Jesus voluntarily  humbled himself. Jesus:

existing in the form of God, didn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped…

There is a paradox here — Jesus is God, and is equal with God; and yet, Jesus does not presume to exploit his divine nature, but fulfills his unique role as Son of God.  He becomes a human being.

Instead of arrogating power and position to himself, Jesus:

emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men.   And being found in human form, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, yes, the death of the cross.

Not only does Jesus, the divine Son of God, take upon himself human form, he takes upon himself the form of a slave!  We see this clearly in the Gospel of John in the Upper Room, when Jesus washes the feet of the disciples as an example to them of the servanthood they need to emulate (John 13:1-20).  We see it when Jesus says of himself in the Gospel of Mark:

whoever wants to become great among you shall be your servant.  Whoever of you wants to become first among you, shall be bondservant of all.  For the Son of Man also came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:43-45).

And then there is the twist, the reversal that should astonish us, except that we’ve become too accustomed to the story — as low as Jesus humbles himself, even unto death, he is raised even higher!

Therefore God also highly exalted him, and gave to him the name which is above every name; that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, those on earth, and those under the earth,  and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

While Paul doesn’t mention the resurrection here, it is assumed.  Jesus is exalted, and given the name above every name — Lord. 

Here we are reminded of Paul’s roots in Judaism.  The name of God in the Hebrew Bible is holy and transcendent.  This is the name I AM revealed in Exodus 3.  And in the Septuagint (which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible), the name Lord is the equivalent of I AM.  Paul is clearly identifying Jesus as God.

So we have here the true nature of Christ. He is of the nature of God — which becomes very important in understanding the deity of Christ and the Trinity; but he humbles himself and takes on the form of a servant, which means he is also fully human.  The only Savior who can save us is one who is both fully God and fully human.

There is a cycle that is completed — Jesus is equal with the Father, but descends to the lowest place, even death; and then because he is obedient even unto death, he is exalted again to the highest place.

Therefore, those who follow Jesus and seek to emulate his servanthood will worship him as Lord.  Not only that, every knee shall bow, and every tongue will confess that he is Lord!

This is an eschatological statement.  In the end all will acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus — whether they are willing to do so or not.  For some, this will be the essence of heaven — for others, who rebel against surrender to God’s authority, it will be hell.

APPLY:  

There is so much doctrine packed into these few verses!

We have here a kind of synopsis of Trinitarian theology.  Jesus Christ is the preexistent Son of God, who was present with the Father at the beginning, who shares in the nature of God.  He is fully God, and yet distinct from the Father.

We are reminded of the doctrine of the Trinity as historically taught since the church Fathers— God is one God in three persons.

And Jesus is also the Word made flesh, who empties himself and takes upon himself the form of a servant, identifying with our sin on the cross so that we may receive his righteousness in exchange.

And he is the exalted High Priest who returns to his rightful place at the right hand of the Father.

Therefore he deserves our unrestrained worship and praise.

But we mustn’t neglect Paul’s injunction, that we are to have the mind that was in Christ.  For us to have his mind requires that we worship him, study his life in the Scriptures, and imitate him.  And we become most like him when we humble ourselves and serve others.

Above all, we must remember that all this is Christ’s doing.  I love the verse from Charles Wesley’s great hymn, “And Can It Be,” that emphasizes Christ’s self-emptying love.

He left his Father’s throne above
(so free, so infinite his grace!),
emptied himself of all but love,
and bled for Adam’s helpless race.
‘Tis mercy all, immense and free,
for O my God, it found out me!
‘Tis mercy all, immense and free,
for O my God, it found out me!

RESPOND: 

St. Irenaeus, one of the early church Fathers, said something quite radical to our ears:

The Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, who did, through His transcendent love, become what we are, that He might bring us to be even what He is Himself.

Isn’t this what Paul is telling us to do when he tells us that we are to have the mind that was in Christ Jesus?

However, we must remember that if this is to happen, it is Christ’s doing.  That’s what we mean by grace, that God is at work in us.

I really love C.S. Lewis’ analogy in his essay The Grand Miracle. He says that what Jesus has done follows a:

huge pattern of descent, down, down, down, and then up again. . . one has the picture of a diver, stripping off garment after garment, making himself naked, then flashing for a moment in the air, and then down through the green, and warm and sunlit water into the pitch black, cold, freezing water, down into the mud and slime, then up again, his lungs almost bursting, back again to the green and warm and sunlit water, and then at last out into the sunshine, holding in his hand the dripping thing he went down to get. This thing is human nature.

Jesus, of course, is the diver who begins his descent after diving from the very throne of God itself, and then descending into human flesh at Bethlehem, living as a Jewish man in Galilee and Judea, descending to the cross and the grave, and, according to many Christians, descending even into hell.  And this same Jesus rises from the deepest, darkest place, from death itself, and returns to heaven in the ascension.

Jesus comes into this world in order to identify with us and take our sin upon himself, and then takes us back with himself into heaven!  That is great news!

Lord, with angels and archangels, and all Christians throughout time, I join in praise of your saving work!  I am in awe of your amazing descent from the right hand of the father to the lowest point with us, and your dizzying re-ascent into heaven.  Help me to have your attitude of servanthood and sacrifice, knowing that without your Spirit in me that is impossible.  Amen.

PHOTOS:

“Philippians 2 Typography Gradient” by Tyler Neyens is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

Epistle for April 14, 2019 (Liturgy of the Passion)

START WITH SCRIPTURE:
Philippians 2:5-11
CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

This passage is one of the clearest and most concise statements in the New Testament about the nature and work of Christ. This passage is believed by some to be part of an early Christian hymn.

The Apostle Paul anticipates the Nicene Creed which was written 300 years later.  The Nicene Creed says that Jesus is:

the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God….
…. for us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary and became truly human.

Paul rehearses what is called the kerygma (i.e., the proclamation of the saving work of Jesus Christ)  about what Christ has done:

• He has come to earth for us, though he was preexistent and equal with God.
• He has been perfectly obedient by accepting death on the cross.
• He has been exalted to the highest place with God the Father.

Paul begins with an exhortation to the Philippians that they are to imitate Christ:

Have this in your mind, which was also in Christ Jesus

The theme of the “imitation of Christ” appears repeatedly throughout the New Testament, not least when Jesus tells his disciples:

Whoever wants to come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. (Mark 8:34).

Paul unpacks his exhortation to have the mind of Christ by exploring the character and ministry of Jesus.

First, Paul’s doctrine supports the doctrine established in the Gospel of John, that Jesus is the preexistent Son of God, and that he is divine.  However, Paul tells us that Jesus voluntarily  humbled himself. Jesus:

existing in the form of God, didn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped…

There is a paradox here — Jesus is God, and is equal with God; and yet, Jesus does not presume to exploit his divine nature, but fulfills his unique role as Son of God.  He becomes a human being.

Instead of arrogating power and position to himself, Jesus:

emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men.   And being found in human form, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, yes, the death of the cross.

Not only does Jesus, the divine Son of God, take upon himself human form, he takes upon himself the form of a slave!  We see this clearly in the Gospel of John in the Upper Room, when Jesus washes the feet of the disciples as an example to them of the servanthood they need to emulate (John 13:1-20).  We see it when Jesus says of himself in the Gospel of Mark:

whoever wants to become great among you shall be your servant.  Whoever of you wants to become first among you, shall be bondservant of all.  For the Son of Man also came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:43-45).

And then there is the twist, the reversal that should astonish us, except that we’ve become too accustomed to the story — as low as Jesus humbles himself, even unto death, he is raised even higher!

Therefore God also highly exalted him, and gave to him the name which is above every name; that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, those on earth, and those under the earth,  and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

While Paul doesn’t mention the resurrection here, it is assumed.  Jesus is exalted, and given the name above every name — Lord. 

Here we are reminded of Paul’s roots in Judaism.  The name of God in the Hebrew Bible is holy and transcendent.  This is the name I AM revealed in Exodus 3.  And in the Septuagint (which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible), the name Lord is the equivalent of I AM.  Paul is clearly identifying Jesus as God.

So we have here the true nature of Christ. He is of the nature of God — which becomes very important in understanding the deity of Christ and the Trinity; but he humbles himself and takes on the form of a servant, which means he is also fully human.  The only Savior who can save us is one who is both fully God and fully human.

There is a cycle that is completed — Jesus is equal with the Father, but descends to the lowest place, even death; and then because he is obedient even unto death, he is exalted again to the highest place.

Therefore, those who follow Jesus and seek to emulate his servanthood will worship him as Lord.  Not only that, every knee shall bow, and every tongue will confess that he is Lord!

This is an eschatological statement.  In the end all will acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus — whether they are willing to do so or not.  For some, this will be the essence of heaven — for others, who rebel against surrender to God’s authority, it will be hell.

APPLY:  

There is so much doctrine packed into these few verses!

We have here a kind of synopsis of Trinitarian theology.  Jesus Christ is the preexistent Son of God, who was present with the Father at the beginning, who shares in the nature of God.  He is fully God, and yet distinct from the Father.

We are reminded of the doctrine of the Trinity as historically taught since the church Fathers— God is one God in three persons.

And Jesus is also the Word made flesh, who empties himself and takes upon himself the form of a servant, identifying with our sin on the cross so that we may receive his righteousness in exchange.

And he is the exalted High Priest who returns to his rightful place at the right hand of the Father.

Therefore he deserves our unrestrained worship and praise.

But we mustn’t neglect Paul’s injunction, that we are to have the mind that was in Christ.  For us to have his mind requires that we worship him, study his life in the Scriptures, and imitate him.  And we become most like him when we humble ourselves and serve others.

Above all, we must remember that all this is Christ’s doing.  I love the verse from Charles Wesley’s great hymn, “And Can It Be,” that emphasizes Christ’s self-emptying love.

He left his Father’s throne above
(so free, so infinite his grace!),
emptied himself of all but love,
and bled for Adam’s helpless race.
‘Tis mercy all, immense and free,
for O my God, it found out me!
‘Tis mercy all, immense and free,
for O my God, it found out me!

RESPOND: 

St. Irenaeus, one of the early church Fathers, said something quite radical to our ears:

The Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, who did, through His transcendent love, become what we are, that He might bring us to be even what He is Himself.

Isn’t this what Paul is telling us to do when he tells us that we are to have the mind that was in Christ Jesus?

However, we must remember that if this is to happen, it is Christ’s doing.  That’s what we mean by grace, that God is at work in us.

I really love C.S. Lewis’ analogy in his essay The Grand Miracle. He says that what Jesus has done follows a:

huge pattern of descent, down, down, down, and then up again. . . one has the picture of a diver, stripping off garment after garment, making himself naked, then flashing for a moment in the air, and then down through the green, and warm and sunlit water into the pitch black, cold, freezing water, down into the mud and slime, then up again, his lungs almost bursting, back again to the green and warm and sunlit water, and then at last out into the sunshine, holding in his hand the dripping thing he went down to get. This thing is human nature.

Jesus, of course, is the diver who begins his descent after diving from the very throne of God itself, and then descending into human flesh at Bethlehem, living as a Jewish man in Galilee and Judea, descending to the cross and the grave, and, according to many Christians, descending even into hell.  And this same Jesus rises from the deepest, darkest place, from death itself, and returns to heaven in the ascension.

Jesus comes into this world in order to identify with us and take our sin upon himself, and then takes us back with himself into heaven!  That is great news!

Lord, with angels and archangels, and all Christians throughout time, I join in praise of your saving work!  I am in awe of your amazing descent from the right hand of the father to the lowest point with us, and your dizzying re-ascent into heaven.  Help me to have your attitude of servanthood and sacrifice, knowing that without your Spirit in me that is impossible.  Amen.

PHOTOS:

“Philippians 2 Typography Gradient” by Tyler Neyens is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

Gospel for October 29, 2017

Inscription on plaque on wall of St. Nonna’s, Altarnun. [photo by John Kroll]

START WITH SCRIPTURE:

Matthew 22:34-46

CLICK HERE TO READ SCRIPTURE ON BIBLEGATEWAY.COM

OBSERVE:

This passage illustrates how Jesus engaged his adversaries in dialogue, and overcame their arguments with the truth.  He never backed down from a confrontation,  nor did he allow himself to be baited or flattered into surrendering the truth.

Once again we find the Pharisees and the Sadducees colluding with one another. This is remarkable because they were ideological and theological adversaries, interpreting the religious and political life of the Jews in very different ways.  But they agreed on the threat posed by Jesus.  This would be like Democrats and Republicans getting together against a common enemy!

So an expert in the Mosaic law challenges Jesus to identify the greatest commandment in the law.  This was a commonplace teaching device among Jewish rabbis and their students.  Quite often, a student would ask his rabbi, “What is the sum of the law that a man can say while standing on one foot?”

Of course, in this case, the question comes freighted with hidden traps.  However Jesus answers, he risks alienating either the Pharisees or the Sadducees.  But Jesus understands the heart of the law far more deeply than his adversaries, and quotes two key laws from Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18.

These laws are linked by one common theme — love.  But Jesus sees that there are two primary directions of love.  The first direction is vertical, regarding the commandment to love God with one’s whole being:

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment.

The other direction of love is horizontal, toward one’s neighbor:

A second likewise is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.

This is a brilliant summary of all 616 laws encoded in the Torah (the first five books of the Bible).  If one loves God and neighbor, then he will obey all the law and the prophets.

Incidentally, the Pharisees accept as part of the scriptures all of what we today consider the Old Testament — the law, the prophets, and the wisdom writings. These are thirty-nine books in all. The Sadducees accepted only the first five books of the Bible (which are called the Torah).

Jesus then turns the table on the Pharisees, knowing that the Pharisees accept the Psalms as part of the Word of God, which the Sadducees do not.  He questions their interpretation of Psalm 110, in which David speaks of the Messiah as his Lord.  Since they believe that the Messiah will be the ideal king and the heir of David, Jesus is asking a very simple question:

If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?

In other words, how can the Messiah be the descendent of David if David calls the Messiah his Lord? This presents a logical conundrum.

Jesus is not necessarily denying his own genealogical descent from David, which is supported by the genealogies in Matthew and Luke’s Gospels, and is also attested elsewhere.  But he may be alluding to his own preexistence as the Son of God. This is how he seems to interpret the Psalm:

The Lord said to my Lord,
sit on my right hand,
until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet

The answer can only be a matter of “both/and.”  Jesus is the preexistent Lord, who is the Second Person of the Trinity and the Son of God — and he is the descendant of David.  Jesus is fully God and fully human.

The Pharisees are confounded by his interpretation of this text, and are left speechless. They simply don’t have the theological depth to grasp what Jesus is implying.

APPLY:  

The application of the first half of this passage seems absolutely simple, and yet absolutely difficult.  It seems so simple to say, “Just love God, and love your neighbor, and you will de facto obey all of the commandments. You will worship God with all your heart, soul and mind; you will be kind to your neighbor.”

But the practice is a different matter.  It requires more than human will; it requires divine intervention.  As Saint Augustine said, “Command what you will, O Lord, and then give what you command.”

But if we make that our aim — to love God with all our being, to love neighbor as ourselves — we will be God’s obedient children.

It is very instructive to remember that love is not just kind feelings — love is grace in action.  As Eliza Doolittle says to a suitor in My Fair Lady, “Don’t talk of love, don’t talk at all; show me.”

RESPOND: 

Love means complete surrender to the other, and willingness to exert oneself for the other.  To me this means that my prayers, my worship, my daily life and business all have the same theme — a love that reaches up to God in earnest yearning, and a love that reaches out to others that their lives might also reach up toward God.  This is truly loving neighbor as myself.

Our Lord, the whole point of studying your Word isn’t so that I can impress others, or “catch” someone in an inconsistency to make me look smart.  The whole point is so that I can know you and love you — and if I do that I will also love all people because you also love all people.  Bring my life into harmony with your love, I pray.  Amen. 

PHOTOS:
"St. Nonna's, Altarnun, Cornwall, UK-4" by John Kroll is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs license.