The Power of Weakness

Crash Course 10

…the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.” 1 Corinthians 1:25 NIV

            In the Gospels Jesus exercised power over crippling diseases, demonic spirits, and natural laws. Even his words demonstrated strength and authority. The guards sent to arrest him fell to the ground when he spoke.

³ So Judas came to the garden, guiding a detachment of soldiers and some officials from the chief priests and the Pharisees. They were carrying torches, lanterns and weapons.

⁴ Jesus, knowing all that was going to happen to him, went out and asked them, “Who is it you want?”

⁵ “Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied.

“I am he,” Jesus said. (And Judas the traitor was standing there with them.)
⁶ When Jesus said, “I am he,” they drew back and fell to the ground.
(John 19, NIV)

            But the next day—the day we commemorate as Good Friday—Jesus appeared powerless, so exhausted and beaten that he couldn’t drag his own cross to the execution site. His hands constrained by nails, his voice quelled by thirst, there would be no miracles that day.

            Except one. At his weakest, Jesus conquered his strongest foes, sin and death.

            Now he assures his followers that his grace and strength will outshine our weakness.

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine,
according to his power that is at work within us,
to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations,
for ever and ever! Amen. (Ephesians 3:20 – 21, NIV)

Beyond the Fab Four

Crash Course 8

            (No, not the Beatles. Not that Fab Four. I mean the Fabulous Four Gospels.)

            The Gospels are not the only place to read about Jesus. The New Testament epistles tell lot about him, too. Peter and John, both disciples and eyewitnesses, wrote five letters between them.

            In his first letter, Peter calls Christ a “lamb without blemish or defect…chosen before the creation of the world… " (1:19 – 20). Only a lamb used in Israel’s sacrificial system would warrant the phrase “without blemish or defect.” Peter understood the significance of Christ’s substitutionary death. Peter also speaks of the resurrection and coming return of Christ (1:3 and 1:7). 

            Peter reveals two intriguing facts about Christ that I haven’t found elsewhere in scripture. (Illuminate me if I’ve missed them.) He says the Spirit of Christ indwelt and guided the prophets who wrote about him in the Hebrew Scriptures (1:11). He also writes that after the Lord’s resurrection, he preached to spirits of the disobedient Noah-era people “in prison.” (3:19 – 20)

            That’s something coming from a fisherman.

            I always imagine Peter excitedly exclaiming, “I was there!” Fifty days after the crucifixion and resurrection, Peter told a Jerusalem crowd, “God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of this fact.” (Acts 2:32) Some years later when Peter wrote his second letter, he said, “We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with him on the sacred mountain” (1:18). 

            I was there! I was there!

            John writes in the first few verses of his first epistle about Christ’s incarnation (taking on human flesh). “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of Life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard…(1:1 – 3)

            In less than 75 words, John manages to say in 7 different ways (highlighted by me) that he was an eyewitness, an earwitness, a handwitness of Christ. 

            Handwitness? Sure. Years ago in Fort Worth, Texas, I was beyond excited to shake hands with presidential candidate Jimmy Carter and his wife. I was an eyewitness, earwitness, and handwitness of the future president. 

            How much more memorable for John to have rubbed elbows with the Messiah in a fishing boat, to have passed him the bread at a meal, to have leaned against him as the disciples all reclined in Jewish fashion around the Passover table. To those who were beginning to deny the Incarnation, John could say, “Hold it right there. I touched him. He was really here.”

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,
and we beheld His glory,
the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,
full of grace and truth. John 1:14, NKJV

The Splendor of the Crucified

The Splendor of the Crucified

            I’ve just recently finished studying the Pentateuch with my two Old Testament Tour classes. They read a lot of passages, weird and/or wonderful, that they probably would have skipped, had I not held homework grades over their heads.

            Exodus 28 maybe fits both categories as it describes the clothing to be created to give “dignity and honor” to the Levitical high priest: A linen robe embellished with gold, blue, purple, and scarlet yarn; golden shoulder ornaments boasting engraved onyx stones; a breastplate set with semi-precious jewels; and on it goes. Aaron, the first high priest of Israel, must have been an awe-inspiring sight arrayed in garments designed by God himself. Engraved in gold, the words “Holy to the Lord” adorned his turban when this magnificent priest entered the holiest place in the Tabernacle.

            Fifteen hundred years later, another high priest appeared with “no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him” (Isaiah 53:2).

            A stripped, bleeding man hung fastened with crude spikes to a rough cross. Sharp thorns, mockingly twisted into a crown, pierced his forehead. His flesh had been bruised and tattered by a scourge. Not awe, but revulsion filled those who saw this man disfigured by torture, “marred beyond human likeness” (Isaiah 52:14).

            Jesus was a high priest like Aaron, entrusted with the dreadful responsibility of gaining forgiveness for the sins of his kinsmen. While Aaron presented the blood of animals, the blood Jesus offered was his own. He took on the ugliness of sin to make us lovely in God’s eyes.

            But that is not the last image of Jesus given to us in scripture. After defeating death, he visited with a number of people over a period of forty days. (Paul lists the people in 1 Corinthians 15.) But even that is not the final image we have of Jesus.

            After ascending to his place of honor at the Father’s right hand, our high priest appeared to John the Apostle in breathtaking splendor, his eyes blazing like fire, his face shining brilliantly like the sun, his voice thundering like rushing water (Revelation 1:12 - 16). Though frighteningly powerful and beautiful, Jesus continues to serve us as a priest.

            “There were many priests under the old system, for death prevented them from remaining in office. But because Jesus lives forever, his priesthood lasts forever. Therefore he is able, once and forever, to save those who come to God through him. He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf” (Hebrews 7:23 – 25, NLT)

            LIVES FOREVER—did you catch that phrase twice in fifty-one words? (I hope my italics helped.) LIVES FOREVER and pleading for you.

            And me.

            Alleluia.