Matthew 21:23-32 Sept.
27, 2020 “The Public
Relations Nightmare”
Jesus was setting up a public
relations nightmare. He is in Jerusalem,
head to head with the chief priests and elders of the people. Jesus has made his triumphal entry into
Jerusalem. There is no more hiding from
the authorities. He openly challenges
them on his journey to the cross.
The question on the table, “Hey Jesus,
by what authority are you doing these things and who gave you this
authority?” The leaders know Jesus
claims God’s power. But THEY need public
opinion, the crowds, in Jerusalem, to back them. If Jesus says His authority is from God, they
can charge Him with blasphemy and whip the crowds up against him. The chief priests and elders then have the
lever they need to get the Romans to carry out the death penalty-fear of a
popular uprising-because Roman law took the death penalty out of the hands of
the local authorities.
But Jesus flips the situation,
answering the question with a question, and one that seems innocent on the face
of it. “Did the baptism of John come
from heaven or was it of human origin?”
The baptism of John was a very
particular part of his ministry. In
Matthew 3, John appears in the Judean wilderness, proclaiming (vs 2) “Repent,
for the kingdom of heaven is near.” In
vs. 6, “They were baptized by him in the River Jordan, confessing their
sins.” This was taking place around John’s
proclamation to make way for Jesus. And
we know that it was by John’s baptism, then the baptism of the Holy Spirit,
that began Jesus’ ministry.
Last week, I said the Kingdom of
Heaven came when the plan of God was fulfilled at Jesus’ resurrection. John simply says the Kingdom of Heaven is
near, and Jesus was near. The entire
life and ministry of Jesus embodies what the Kingdom of Heaven is going to be. His life is the model that continues to serve
as the ‘how to’ of Kingdom making to this very day.
But first, Jesus’ public relations
nightmare. The crowds love John, they
believe him to be a prophet. Remember a
few weeks ago, Jesus asked the disciples “Who do the people say that I
am?” John the Baptist, equivalent to
Elijah, equivalent to Jeremiah, the Prophet.
If the leadership says John’s ministry was of human origin, they deny
his Godly obedience, and the crowds will turn on them. So they cannot choose that response.
On the other hand, His baptism by
John was Jesus’ “Coming Out” moment into ministry. So to say John’s baptism came from heaven
would, first, push the leaders into a corner to try and answer they question of
why they do not believe what John did.
Although, Matt 3:7 records that a lot of leaders DID believe as many
Pharisees and Sadducees came to the Jordan to be baptized. To believe that John’s ministry is from
heaven will force the leadership to accept Jesus’ ministry as well, because it
was at John’s baptism where the Spirit came down FROM HEAVEN to land upon
Jesus. So, to prevent themselves from
completely undermining their own position, the leaders cannot choose that
response.
Was the crowd really that
powerful? In vs. 26, it says they
leaders would not deny the authority of John for fear of that crowd. They thought he was a prophet. Is the crowd really this tool that can be
used to manipulate events? Well,
consider what we read about during Holy Week.
The crowds build to such a frenzy that they are crying out for
blood. Pilate found no fault in Jesus,
wanted to release Him. But the anger of
the mob, the cries of “Crucify him!”, fomented by the leadership, the potential
for a violent uprising, they forced Pilate’s hand. The death of Jesus became a political
expedient to quiet the crowds. That is
the power the leadership is trying to harness in our passage today. That is the power that Jesus is foiling, for
now.
This is where Jesus is, in a city
where the mood of the crowd can cause even the religious leadership to back
down. So they look like weaklings. “We don’t know.” To which Jesus replies, “You did not answer
my question, I will not answer yours.”
Left them even angrier for being played the fool.
But Jesus is not done. Time to press the point. He tells a parable. A man has two sons. He tells one to do something and the boy says
he won’t but then goes and does it anyway.
He has another son who says he WILL, but then doesn’t. Who does the will of the Father? It is the son who says he will not do as his
father orders, but then goes and does it anyway. These are the tax collectors and prostitutes,
Jesus says, naming the two lowest orders of sinners in the culture of the
time. They sinned, did not do the will
of the Father, but, in John, they were baptized on the confession of their
sins, obeying the call to repentance, and did the will of the Father. But the leadership, Jesus takes another shot
at them. They say they do the will of
the Father, they claim the authority of God as their political authority, but
do NOT do what the Father wills.
According to Matthew 3, they tried to get John’s blessing. They came down to where he was on the Jordan,
but John basically chases them off, calling them a bunch of snakes.
But while Jesus is very careful to
keep the conversation about John’s ministry, it is very obvious that
ultimately, these leaders are condemned for their denial of Jesus’
ministry.
Yet even as Jesus runs rings around
the leadership, he tells them again what they must do to enter the Kingdom of
Heaven. They must repent. Repentance is opening our sinful lives to the
Lord, confessing, apologizing, asking for, and receiving the forgiveness
offered in our salvation. This is where
the Kingdom of Heaven finds its beginning in the life of each believer, then
and now.
Last week, we spoke about election,
how God picks each of us for the Kingdom of Heaven. Today, it is our response, the response of
the sinner, by the means of repentance, that we are welcomed into the
Kingdom. Knowing that we are sinners,
knowing that we need God’s forgiveness, and acting on that knowledge,
repenting, is how we receive the merciful grace of Christ and gain entry into the
Kingdom of Heaven.
Repentance today is a difficult
concept. To repent is to admit there is
something we must repent from, that there are behaviors in our lives that are
unacceptable to God and in need of forgiveness and change. I wonder if Jesus’ examples make it even
harder for us. Tax collectors and
prostitutes, consider how they translate to the present day. Prostitution is an illegal activity, one that
‘good people’ would never stoop to. And
as much as we realize today about how many women are forced into the sex trade,
there is still a huge taboo in our culture against people who sell their bodies
for money.
In the modern day, the tax collector
is a little harder to condemn. This is
not about IRS agents. The tax collector
in the days of Jesus we might consider as a state-sponsored loan shark, a Roman
collaborator. They got rich, the Romans
got rich, and the people had no recourse against them. We have no context today about collaborators
with the invaders who have conquered us.
We might remember stories going back to the end of World War 2, when
areas were liberated from the Nazis, there was a reckoning with the people who
had collaborated. They were routinely
hanged, shot, and humiliated.
In either case, it is a HUGE jump
from there to us. We can say that sin is
sin, but does the heart really put on the same level our ‘petty’ sins as those
who would sell their bodies for money or those who would collaborate with an
enemy against their own citizens. It is
the imposition of a rather draconian black and white system of good and evil on
a world where sin feels far more like multiple shades of grey.
But the repentance Jesus calls for,
that the leaders would have needed to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, it is a
cultural level of sin. The chief priests
and elders of the people are actively working against the ministry of God
through Jesus. What is the cultural
level of sin today? Something we would
not consider necessary for repentance?
How about the Black Lives Matter movement? The statistics are clear, if you are black,
the odds of dying or being injured or simply abused by law enforcement aremuch
higher. But it is hard for the white
Christian who thinks in terms of personal sins to see what we have to repent. “I didn’t do it.” Collectively, we do not approve of a culture
in law enforcement that stereotypes and disproportionately picks on people of
color. But I did nothing that needs me
to repent. Or did I?
I would suggest that there is a cultural
context for repentance today. We live on
a world where there are more people than at any time in our history. But we are also living in a world where we
can provide equality for these people better than at any time in our
history. Poverty no longer needs to be a
thing. Hunger no longer needs to be a
thing. We do not have to better
ourselves at the expense of environmental degradation. The individual sins pale in comparison to the
systemic ones.
That is what the leadership is being
condemned for by Jesus. They are systematically
trying to squash the love of God come through Jesus Christ. So the sin that we might need to repent from
is the one that feels too big for me to fix.
Because it is something that the collective of Christians are not taking
a stand on, not saying together, “We believe Jesus says ‘This is wrong’.” Or our righteous anger gets politicized. Consider the pro-life movement. The political right love to make the argument
that this is THE Christian response to the unwanted pregnancy. To accept that premise is then to accept
everything else that the political right stands for.
And yet we live in a time where
pregnancy can be universally prevented. Do
we make the call that birth control should be universal? Do we make the call that men must also take
responsibility for preventing pregnancy?
Or do we simply buy into the dominant message of the Church that there
is no conversation but abstinence? Or
that command must be taken of the mother’s body? Or that once the baby is born, the voice of
the Church disappears and all the responsibility is dumped on the woman?
Why is there no comparable Faith
movement to support babies born into poverty?
To tackle childhood hunger? The
headlines focus more on childhood obesity.
Why is there no comparable Faith movement against violence in
schools? We have in place every measure
that we can think of against fire in the schools. But hundreds of thousands of our children are
killed, injured, bullied, stolen from, victimized each year. But the silence in the church is deafening.
Those are the hot button issues
where repentance finds its place in the 21st century. When John said, “Repent, for the Kingdom of
Heaven is near” encompasses the individual sins of people needing Christ AND
the cultural sins of not living out the full love of neighbor.
This is especially true when we
understand that the Kingdom of Heaven is not coming at the end of time, but came
in Christ, is already here, is being built.
Repentance is not only gaining God’s forgiveness before we appear before
the Judgement Seat. Repentance is the
way to build the Kingdom of Heaven NOW.
I am sorry if this sounds like the advertisement for a new housing
development but “The Better Life Starts Now.” We need to understand the full implications of
the Kingdom of Heaven.
The Kingdom of Heaven is not just
about the End of Time. It is about
now. In fact, it is more about now. It is not simply about the individual
Christian repenting to receive Jesus’ individual forgiveness. It is about the entire community of faith
repenting to receive Jesus’ forgiveness when we fail to take on a culture in
need of redemption-especially when we see in the voices that claim to speak for
Jesus messages that are ultimately harmful to the Children of God. These messages come from a point of view that
now, this earth, this time, doesn’t matter, that only the End matters.
But the Kingdom of Heaven is already
here. Repentance is now. The investment of God’s love through us is
for all of God’s children. We have the
technical capacity to make the world a better place. What we need is the spiritual will to follow
God’s path and make the world a better place for all God’s Children. Amen.
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