Meditation: FOR CHRIST's SAKE by John de Gruchy

FOR CHRIST'S SAKE

Colossians 1:15-20

Acts 1:1-11

"Jesus was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight?"

The phrase "for Christ's sake" trips off the tongue of Western secular society with such regularity in conversation, movies or on TV,  that it must now be one of the most often used expletives in the English-speaking world.  I googled the phrase to check it out and discovered some interesting information, including a movie entitled "For Christ's Sake" and something called "For Christ's Sake Torrent." which I decided did not warrant further investigation.  Otherwise there was not much more beyond the obvious and the pious.  Together with "for God's sake" or "for goodness sake," "for Christ sake" has long been used to express annoyance and frustration, but now it seems it is the trendy thing to say in certain circles.  Some might regard this as blasphemy, which it undoubtedly is, but I think it has just become another one of those expressions people unthinkingly use to express their gut feelings about such things as the outcome of the British election or the inept playing of the Sharks Rugby team.  In any case, most Christians have long acknowledged that you do not react of blasphemy by beheading or imprisoning those guilty of it; it is both unnecessary -- for Christ does not need our defence -- and counter-productive, because he taught us to love our enemies, even those who speak ill of him.

Two weeks ago I referred to the comment made by Dietrich Bonhoeffer that the problem with the church is that Jesus too often disappears from sight.  Jesus is lost in the institution or dogma so instead of the world seeing him at work in the world through the life of his followers, he is hidden from view. They might even say "for Christ's sake, why don't you Christians truly follow Jesus?!"  And they would be making a good point in saying so.  Like the Greeks who came to Jesus' disciples long ago and asked to see him, there are people today who might follow Jesus if it were not for the fact that Christianity and the church seem to get in the way, or so they say. For there is certainly another side to the story.

Today is Ascension Day, so those  familiar with the story as told at the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles might well ask "is this not what happened precisely that first Ascension Day?  Do we not read in the opening chapter of Acts that while his disciples were watching, "Jesus was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight?"  Yes, you could say the Ascension is all about Jesus disappearing from sight! But it is really about Jesus entering into a new dimension of reality, no less real than when he was with his disciples during his earthly life.  Only now he is Jesus the Christ of faith. But who is this Christ in whom we believe?

"Christ" is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word "Messiah" which means "the Lord's anointed."  It was a word used to refer to kings like David in ancient Israel whom God anointed to lead and guide his people.  It was even used to describe the pagan ruler Cyrus who allowed the Israelites to return to Jerusalem from exile in Babylon.  And it was used by the prophets in anticipating the one who would come to redeem Israel from all its enemies and bring in the reign of justice and peace.  After the resurrection of Jesus his followers came to believe that he was truly this promised Messiah or Christ, the promised anointed one through whose death and resurrection God would established his reign of righteousness on earth.  This was the good news they were now commissioned to preach to the world.

So Luke, who wrote the book of Acts, begins by telling us that in the gospel he previously wrote he recorded " all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning until the day when he was taken up to heaven."  In his second volume we call the Acts of the Apostles, he continues the story of Jesus, but now it is about  all that Jesus did through his followers after his Ascension and the gift of his Spirit at Pentecost.  In other words, Acts is the continuation of Jesus' story, but in a new mode of being in the world.  Instead of Jesus being confined to the hills of Galilee and the streets of Jerusalem,  he is universally present in every time and place through his Spirit.   

But the word "Christ" now has meanings it did not have before.  First of all, the Christ is the One who was humiliated and who suffered to redeem the world.   In other words the meaning of the word Christ is now defined by the life and passion of Jesus.  To understand the Christ we have to remember the story of Jesus, all that he said and did.  But then there is another shift in the understanding of who Christ truly is as depicted in the writings of Paul and John in the New Testament and soon in the icons of the Church.   Paul speaks of the cosmic Christ in whom "all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell," in fact, the one through whom "God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things."  This is breathtaking stuff.  The Jesus of Nazareth with whom the disciples had walked and talked, the Jewish Messiah, is now understood as the Lord of life, "the image of the invisible God...in whom all things hold together."  He is, according to John's Gospel, "the living Word" through whom the world was made, the Word who is the light of the world.

Many thinking people have a problem with this astounding claim because they think it means that Christianity is therefore the only true religion. But that is to miss the point.  In the light of the Ascension, Christianity does not have a special claim on Jesus and therefore on God.  Jesus the Christ does not  belong to his disciples. Jesus as the Christ is not ours, not the possession of the church.  Jesus as the cosmic Christ transcends Christianity and all other religions.  Through his Spirit he is at work everywhere healing and making whole, serving the poor and setting the oppressed free,  working for justice, peace and reconciliation. Wherever there is hope and love, there is the cosmic Christ, the fullness of God, present through the Spirit even though he may be known by other names.  Yes, there are many people who are not Christian who are doing the things Jesus even if not in his name.  And they are doing so because the cosmic Christ is universally at work reconciling the world to God through his Spirit. 

So on Ascension Day we declare that Jesus the Christ is the cosmic Lord and giver of life, not that he is the founder of Christianity.  He is the one in and through whom we are reconciled to each other and to God, the One in and through whom we are made whole.  This is the good news we proclaim for the sake of the whole world.  Through his Spirit we witness through our lives and deed to what the cosmic Christ is doing in the world, and we do so "for Christ's sake."

John de Gruchy

Volmoed 

14 May 2015 Ascension Day

Meditation: KEEPING CHRISTIANITY CHRISTIAN by John de Gruchy

KEEPING CHRISTIANITY CHRISTIAN 

John 12:20-26

"Sir, we wish to see Jesus!"

Our daughter Jeanelle recently drew our attention to an article in the British newspaper, The Guardian" (25 April) titled "Why I answered the call of convent life" in which it was reported that an increasing number of young women in England and Wales are becoming nuns.  This is a surprising turn of events for not so long ago the number was rapidly shrinking.  But during the past two years the number of Catholic women entering convents was seventy-four, that is a 25-year high compared to only seven who joined ten years ago.    And already this year 420 people have registered an interest in becoming monks or nuns in the Church of England Community of St. Anselm in London.  In trying to explain this growing number of applications, the prior of the Community simply says that "they want to be all out for Jesus" in the life of the world.  They choose their vocation not to escape the world, but because they want to devote their lives more fully to serving the needs of others. 

There is so much in the history of Christianity that fills us with both sadness, despondency and even anger.  I need not list all the horrors associated with Christianity from crusades and inquisitions to colonial conquest.  We all know the story, one which, tragically continues today when Christianity becomes confused with the interests of empires and nations, or identified with religious intolerance of others and narrow bigotry.  All of which is a contradiction of what Jesus taught, the life he lived, and his death of the cross. So it comes as a welcome breath of fresh air to read about this new generation of monks and nuns in Britain who "want to be all out for Jesus" in a way that seeks to serve the real needs of the world.  And they are not alone.  There are many more younger people like them who are doing the same in different ways across the globe without becoming monks and nuns.  It is this rejuvenation of commitment to serve Jesus by serving others that keeps Christianity Christian.

According to the gospel reading today, some Greeks came to the festival in Jerusalem to worship in the Temple during the week that Jesus was crucified.  They had heard about this Jesus of Nazareth who had raised Lazarus from the dead, they had seen him in the distance, but they really wanted to meet and get to know him.  So they came to the disciples and said "We wish to see Jesus!"  So the disciples introduced them to Jesus, and he in turn told them about the meaning of what was happening to him and what it meant for them to follow him. 

This cameo of a story is a wonderful description of the task of the church.  Like those first disciples, it is enable others to "see Jesus" so that they can discover for themselves who he is.  For it is only as people discover Jesus for themselves and follow him that Christianity remains Christian.  Yes, of course, like all religious movements, Christianity needs institutions and traditions to ensure that the story of Jesus is passed on from one generation to the next, but too often in the process Jesus disappears from sight.  Outsiders cannot see Jesus; all they can see is the trappings of another religion which hides Jesus from view. 

It is just like sport.  You cannot keep cricket alive without cricket clubs, coaches, match fixtures and making cricket balls and bats, just as a nation cannot function without those institutions of state that enable it to do so.  But it is not the sports clubs or the parliaments that keep the spirit of sport or of a nation alive and well.  Often they become corrupt and serve their own interests instead of the spirit of sport or the needs of society.  It is the passion and commitment of sports men and women that keep the game alive; just as it is people committed to the common good that keep a country on track.   In the same way, Christianity needs its institutions and traditions, but it fails to be Christian if Jesus disappears from sight.   What keeps Christianity Christian is people who follow Jesus.

On several occasions in his letters St. Paul describes the church as the "body of Christ."  This has often been misunderstood, especially when the church as an institution claims an authority and acts in a triumphalistic way in the name of Christ as though it were the Lord rather Jesus,  the servant of others.  What Paul means is that through the work of the Spirit of Jesus, the church becomes the real presence of the risen Christ in the world.  It is the Spirit of Jesus that makes and keeps the church the body of the risen Christ.

We misunderstand the resurrection of Christ if we simply think of it as something that happened two thousand years ago to Jesus of Nazareth.   Yes, something did happen that first Easter morning.  I believe, with the first witnesses,  that when Mary and Peter and the others came to tomb it was empty.  Even so this cannot be proved simply by historical analysis; it is an event shrouded in mystery as is evident in the various stories in the gospels which tell of Jesus' appearance to his disciples.  Jesus is real, but his reality is different to what it was previously.  They recognise him as the Master with whom they had walked and talked together, but he is now in a different dimension.  A spiritual dimension which which certainly touches their lives, but he is beyond their grasp and only known to faith.  Through the resurrection, the Spirit of Jesus has been let loose in the world. 

There is, in other words, an inseparable connection between the Easter message and Pentecost when the Holy Spirit takes hold of people and they begin to witness to Jesus. The resurrection of Jesus as the Christ is the releasing of the Spirit of Jesus in the life of the world in an act of new creation that continues to have a transforming impact on the world.  So the proof of the resurrection is is seen in the lives of ordinary people who are transformed by the Spirit of Jesus and bear witness to all that he said and did.  And it is precisely this that keeps Christianity Christian.

John de Gruchy

Volmoed  30 April 2015