I made a
comment on Facebook that generated more responses than most of my posts do. I
said, “The more I read the Gospels, the more I see how comparable first century
Judaism is to 21st century Christianity.”
The comment
was provoked when my devotions had me reading Matthew 7-9. In the Sermon on the
Mount, Jesus says, “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and
broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But
small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find
it” (NIV ‘84; Matthew 7:13-14). The saying seems to address a deep issue that
afflicted first-century Israel, namely, presumption, or perhaps better said, an
arrogance born of their election. They rightly took pride in their election as
God’s holy people. Consider Paul’s encomium to Israel in Romans 9! “Theirs is
the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of
the law, the temple worship and the promises. Theirs are the patriarchs, and
from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, forever
praised! Amen” (NIV ’84; Romans 9:4-5). But rightful pride often grows to
arrogance and presumption and Israel seems to have fallen into that trap,
especially considering their attitude towards the Gentiles. When you start
taking your election as making you qualitatively better than others, then you’ve
forgotten that your election is by grace, too.
I make two
connections to the contemporary American church. First, I’m always struck by
this set of statistics. Even with recent losses, between 70-80% of Americans
self-identify as Christians (depending who’s doing the counting). However, only
about 20% of Americans are actually in church any given weekend. So, there’s a
claim—a presumption—to the name Christian, but not much practice behind it. I
call it cultural Christianity. It’s like a person saying, “I know I’m not Hindu
or Muslim, so I guess I must be Christian.” In that vision of Christianity, the
measure is often, “I’m a good person,” and “good” is defined by the values of
the culture. (In our era, “good” usually means some variation on “tolerant” or “accepting.”)
If that’s not the broad way, I don’t know what is.
Second, there’s
sure a temptation to feel pretty good about yourself if you’re one of those
people who actually does participate in religious activities on anything like a
regular basis. It’s not in Matthew, but it’s in Luke—the parable of the
Pharisee and the tax collector, in which the Pharisee says, “I’m sure glad I’m
not like everyone else!” (See Luke 18.) That's a too-easy presumption that loses sight of the grace of God, too.
Then,
reading on, I bumped into Jesus’ saying that the Pharisees should go and “learn
what this means, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice’” (Matthew 9:13; repeated again
in Matthew 12:7). Now we all know that there were Sadducees and Pharisees in
Israel in Jesus’ day; there was also a group called the Essenes. (The Essenes
don’t appear in the New Testament, but the Jewish-Roman historian Josephus
tells us about them.) What these three groups had in common and what kept them
apart was the question, “Who’s really a Jew?” On the one hand, everyone who was
born a Jew was a Jew. On the other hand, some Jews were faithful and others
weren’t. So, there was lively debate about who was faithful enough. That’s why
the Pharisees made such a big deal about circumcision, dietary laws, Sabbath
observation, and ceremonial cleanness. These practices served as badges that
demonstrated that one was a serious and faithful (and seriously faithful) Jew.
(The Essenes, for their part, were even stricter about their observations and
practices.) And there was a lot at stake with this question. When the expert in
the law asked Jesus what he must do to inherit a portion in the age to come—a question
that Luke specifically says was a test—he is asking, “What do I have to do to
be marked as a true Jew worthy of God’s reign?” (See Luke 10.)
Jesus, of
course, regularly tweaked the Pharisees on just this question, purposefully
healing on Sabbath, allowing his disciples to pluck grain on the Sabbath,
touching lepers and dead bodies, and chiding the Pharisees that they should be
more concerned with what comes out of the mouth than with what goes in it.
Unfortunately,
I see a lot of that same kind of thing going on in the church today. As I read
Jesus’ words, “I desire mercy not sacrifice,” I got thinking about the way a
lot of pastors I know are. I got thinking of the way I once was (and still am,
unfortunately). What I mean is this: we pastors spend seem to judge each others'
practices pretty harshly, and a lot of times that judgment leads to a certain
greater-than-thou attitude. Name the issue and you can see the party lines
coalescing. “I use the hymnal liturgies; you don’t. I’m more Lutheran than you.”
“I use a lectionary; you don’t. I’m more Lutheran than you.” “I use the
one-year lectionary; you don’t…” You get the idea. The Pharisees narrowed the
Sadducees’ ideas about what was acceptable for a ‘good Jew.’ The Essenes
narrowed the Pharisees’ definitions even more. And then Jesus just blew up
their whole world by eating with tax collectors and sinners. I wonder if we
should think through that statement a little more, “I desire mercy, not
sacrifice.”
Anyhow,
that’s what I was thinking about for those who wondered. There’s a lot more
that could be said and probably should be said. And it’s probably more than I
should have said, electronic forums being what they are…
