Foothills Congregational Church The Rev. W. Matthew Broadbent

United Church of Christ First Sunday in Lent

461 Orange Ave., Los Altos, CA 94022 February 10, 2008

Matthew: WHO DO YOU SAY THAT I AM?

Matthew 4:1-11

Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, He was asking His disciples, 'Who do people say that the Son of Man is?' And they said, 'Some say John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; but still others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.' He said to them, 'But who do you say that I am?'" (Matthew 16:13-15)

This is a question that theologians, historians, philosophers, and average lay persons have pondered for centuries. Who was Jesus? Was he just a good man or philosopher who left us with some virtuous teachings to live by? Was he just another prophet? Or was he a madman or who thought he was divine, or an impostor who claimed to be God? Did he even really exist? There is a very interesting website called <jesusneverexisted.com> that has some fascinating material. Or was Jesus just a fabrication of Paul and early leaders of the church? Was the establishment of a new religion a grab for power by some men two thousand years ago?

Why is it important to ask this question today? In part because I hear people, in our liberal-progressive churches, speak dismissively of Jesus. A young minister told me of people in his church who criticize him if he preaches “too much Jesus.” He was even offered a free trip to the Westar Institute – the old Jesus Seminar in Santa Rosa – to get a theological upgrade. Is there such a thing as having too much Jesus?

I listen to some people talk about Jesus and there is, almost, a visible wince. Our popular image of Jesus is, as Marcus Borg describes (Jesus a New Vision, p. 2) “a divine or semi-divine figure, whose purpose was to die for the sins of the world, and whose life and death open up the possibility of eternal life. Its answers to the three questions of identity, purpose and message are clear. As the divinely begotten Son of God, he was sent into the world for the purpose of dying on the cross as a means of reconciliation between God and humankind, and his message consisted primarily of inviting his hearers to believe that what he said about himself and his role in salvation was true.” This is a very personalized version of faith. We have become accustomed to seeing this Jesus as the god-man who will judge us, and if we are found worthy, forgive us and let us enter into the realm of salvation. This leads to a judgmental faith.

There is a Jesus fatigue out there. I have heard more than one person say to me “I need something different.” When I hear this I wonder if we really know the Jesus of the Bible, or is it just the Jesus of popular opinion? Are we aware of the multiplicity of views in the Gospels, as well as in the non-canonical Gospels of Judas, and Thomas and Mary, or the Secret Gospel of John, among others. There is a richness of material out there that gives us a chance to ask the question for ourselves: “Who do you say that I am?”

This is what I propose we do through this Lenten season. We begin today with Matthew by asking those investigative questions: who, what, when, where, and why.

Who was Matthew? Tradition claims (Matt. 9:9) he was the disciple who was a tax collector before he became a follower of Jesus. Some commentators try to make a link between his system of organizing a beautifully structured Gospel story with his ability as an accountant. But modern scholarship says the writer of the Gospel of Matthew was an anonymous writer who used the title of Matthew to honor the Jewish-Christian community that had survived the destruction of Jerusalem following the Jewish-Roman War of 66-70 CE. The best guess is that the gospel was written between 80-90 CE in Antioch of Syria, which hosted a large Jewish community in this provincial capital.

When Jerusalem was destroyed it was a holocaust of massive proportions. Not only were residents slaughtered, but Rome took the temple apart, stone by stone, shipping the pieces to various parts of the empire for public works projects. The rest of the population of the area was also shipped out to the provinces in what was the first of several exiles which is collectively known as the Great Diaspora.

When the temple was destroyed, so was ancient Judaism. What survived was the Pharisaic movement that addressed the question: What makes us authentically Jewish? The answer was tradition and Torah. The other surviving element was the group who clung to the inspiration of Jesus, the failed Jewish Messiah.

The writer of Matthew answers Jesus’ question - “Who do you say that I am?” - in the very first line of the book, literally, the book of genesis of Jesus the Messiah… For Matthew, Jesus is the promised Messiah – not the one that was expected – but the one God has given. To understand what he means by this claim it is important to understand the context in which this claim is made.

Jesus and his followers failed as a political movement, but succeeded as a spiritual movement. Violence is not defeated by greater violence - despite the fact that we keep trying it again and again – rather violence is defeated by a transformation of culture directed toward a higher purpose which Jesus calls the kingdom of God. Jesus is the agent of transformation from a culture of violence to a community of shalom (peace) through his own death, and more importantly, through the witness of resurrection by the early church. For this reason Matthew calls Jesus Messiah.

We see the arc of this story line in the beginning and ending of the Gospel. Matthew 1 is a genealogy of the male line: 14 generations from Abraham to David, then 14 generations from David to the Babylonian Exile, and finally 14 generations from the Exile to the Messiah. This is all nice and neat and gives evidence to the argument that an accountant must have put this together. But read more closely and you will notice there are these women tucked into the list, all of them victims of violence and abuse.

Tamar is abused by her husband who dies, treated violently by his brother who also dies, and is then thrown out by her father-in-law because she assumed to be a barren woman. She lives the life of a prostitute who is later impregnated by this same father-in-law, Judah, at which point she is able to claim her rightful place in the tribe. It is an amazing story (Genesis 38) I can’t do it justice in the time I have.

Then we have Rahab, another prostitute, who lived in the walls of Jericho and assisted the spies who plotted the downfall of the city. Ruth was left destitute when her husband died, but refused to go back to her home, committing herself to her equally destitute mother-in-law, Naomi. Later she marries Boaz, after sleeping with him one night on the threshing room floor. She is the great grandmother of King David.

Bathsheba the mother of Solomon was raped by David, who then had her husband killed. And then we have Mary, who is pregnant with Jesus, and whom Joseph had the right to have stoned to death. All these women tell the hidden story of the cycle of violence and death, and yet it is through them that the possibility of redemption is passed on from generation to generation. How can we possibly overcome this pattern that is embedded in our cultural DNA? It will take a spiritual mutation, a holy virus to infect us and change future generations.

Who is worthy to be that agent of change? Matthew presents Jesus case in our scripture text this morning – what is commonly called the “Temptation in the Wilderness.” The story tells us that the Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. Our view of this scene is tempered by theological visions of the Middle Ages, and the cosmic battle between the Devil and God. In Jewish thinking the tempter was an agent of God, a devil’s advocate, a prosecutor sent to test Jesus’ ability to carry out God’s will in the world. The first question deals with basic human needs. Jesus was a long time in the wilderness (this is the meaning of 40 days) and he was hungry. “If you think you are a substitute for God then command these stones to turn into bread.” But Jesus remains humble, and quoting from the Book of Moses, Deuteronomy 8:3: One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.

Test #2. Jesus is taken to the pinnacle of the temple and told to step out into the void. “You can be like superman,” says the tempter, and then he quotes Psalm 91:11-12: God will command the angels… and on their hands they will bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone. But Jesus clings to his humanness and will not put the Lord God to the test (Deut. 6:16).

Finally, in test #3, Jesus is shown all the nations of the world and told he will have power over all the nations, he will be greater than the emperor, greater than Alexander, if only…and again, Jesus quotes Deut. 6:13: Worship the Lord your God and serve only him.

Think of this scene of the Temptation as Jesus examination for ordination. Does he have an adequate understanding of scripture? Apparently, yes, he does. Is this a genuine call, or does he have an inflated ego, visions of grandiosity? No, he seems to have a humbleness about him. Is the claim to be the son of God going to his head? Is this a power trip like it is for the emperor who claims divinity, or like the popes in later centuries who will command armies, or modern political leaders who claim God’s blessing on their wars in the perpetuation of the cycle of violence. No, Jesus denies any claim to political power.

Then, how can Matthew claim the Jesus is Messiah. The common understanding was that the messiah comes to save the nation, throw out the tyrants, establish holy law, and institute righteous ritual in the temple. Jesus is a failed messiah. We even witness this in his dying words on the cross – his last temptation when he is mocked by the soldiers, Hail king of the Jews (Matt. 27:29), and laughed at by the bandits who were crucified next to him, saying He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he wants to…And even Jesus wondered and faltered at the end crying out Eli, eli lema sabachthani? “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” And then he died, an empty, hollowed shell of a man.

Except, this is not the end of the story. Matthew is speaking to a people who have been crucified, whose temple has been destroyed, the stones used for bridges, bath houses and brothels to serve the military power of the state. Their identity was crushed and their faith in God mocked. It was then, after the last temptation, in the hollow silence of fate that God spoke, and the early church heard it. Go therefore an make disciples of all nations, baptizing them… teaching them…(transforming the world to a new way of being in the world). And remember, I am with you always to the end of the age (28:19-20).

Jesus asks: “Who do you say that I am?” Well, you are like John the Baptist but something much more than an itinerant preacher. “Who do you say that I am?” You are a prophet like Elijah, but not out to kill the competing prophets of Baal, or the priests of Rome. “Who do you say that I am?” You are more like Moses, a leader of people, but not a dictator, or emperor – no Alexander or Nero or Napolean. “Who do you say that I am?” You, who were born in violent times and died a violent death, are the one who comes to save us from ourselves, by emptying yourself, until you are a hollow vessel ringing with the pure voice of God calling us to live into Shalom, the peace of God.