by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Jan 26, 2015
Church, it’s time to go all the way in embracing the Jewish Jesus.
Yes, Jesus is seen as a Jew in many pulpits and pews, but usually as an exception, an anomaly.
In too many sermons, commentaries, and hymnals his teachings on love, inclusion, and forgiveness are set up as a contrast against the Jews and Judaism of his day. What makes him distinctive, we say, is that he’s not like the other Jews. He reached people on the margins. He talked to women. He ate with sinners and tax collectors. But these characterizations of a Jewish Jesus are still distorted. Dr. Amy-Jill Levine explains why:
“Jesus becomes the rebel who, unlike every other Jew, practices social justice. He is the only one to speak with women; he is the only one who teaches nonviolent responses to oppression; he is the only one who cares about the ‘poor and the marginalized’ (that phrase has become a litany in some Christian circles). Judaism becomes in such discourse a negative foil: whatever Jesus stands for, Judaism isn’t it; what Jesus is against, Judaism epitomizes the category.”
Yes, Jesus reached out to all kinds of people. Yes, he counseled mercy and patience. Yes, he healed and set people free. But rather than see Jesus as different from the Jews around him, I suggest it is time to see Jesus’ ministry as a natural evolution of the whole history of Jewish teaching, ethics, morality, practice, and service of God. Otherwise he serves as an archetypal anti-Jew.
I’d like to explain the phenomenon, and then give you 3 criteria to check for to see if your preaching and teaching sets up Jesus as a Jew or as an anti-Jew.
Think about it.
If Jesus was fully Jewish, operating in a Jewish context, living a Jewish life, studying Jewish texts, praying to a Jewish God, clothing himself in the Jewish commandments, where else did it come from?
If we believe that Jesus was one with the God of Israel, then surely, Jesus drew upon the same Source and sources that inspired all the other teachers, miracle-workers, prophets, and kings that preceded and surrounded him.
Quite often the rabbis of his era were arriving at the same conclusions he was, from the Golden Rule, to teachings on Sabbath, the importance of love of God and neighbor. Others were engaged in calling disciples, healing, and miracle-working. Even his interactions with women, children, and Gentiles were not anomalous.
More than that, the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament is marked by theological and behavioral leaps, beginning with Abraham’s innovation that God is one, not many; continuing with Moses’ skilled but previously unknown leadership in leading the Israelites from slavehood to peoplehood; game-changing visions from prophets; and the courageous renewal of Judaism under Nehemiah and Ezra after the return from Babylonian exile.
Jesus is the product of generations of Jewish innovators, completely in line with the spiritual genius that went before him and even those that came after him.
Paul wasn’t kidding when he said about his fellow Israelites, “to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and from them, according to the flesh, comes the Messiah, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen.”
How do you know if you are preaching and teaching about Jesus as a Jew or an anti-Jew? Check out these 3 critiera:
1. You rely heavily on the compare and contrast method of preaching and teaching: Jesus is the “good guy” and his Jewish contemporaries such as Pharisees, Saducees, scribes and lawyers are the “bad guys.” This creates an us v. them dynamic that creates enemies. In other words, in order to stand with Jesus, I have to stand against somebody or something else.
2. You remove Jesus from a Jewish context altogether, substituting “the church” for the actual Jewish people, Torah, land, and institutions he interacted with. Erasing his Jewish context doesn’t help. It’s like claiming being color-blind in a society where white privilege still operates.
3. You portray the Pharisees as uni-dimensional: hypocritical, out to get him, narrow-minded or legalistic. Of all the Jewish groups present in his day, Jesus himself was most closely aligned with the Pharisees. His way of teaching, setting up a fence for the Law, and seeing the world has more in common with them than any other group.
Putting this perspective into practice will take a renewed scholarship among preachers, pray-ers, poets, professors, and Bible study writers and teachers. I realize it’s going to take some work to leave behind comfortable but dishonest dichotomies and ready stereotypes. This won’t be easy for already overworked church leaders. But there are many excellent resources that can help. It’s worth the effort.
We are grand participants in a historic reconciliation, the fruits of which are only beginning to be realized. Understanding that Jesus operated within a rich spiritual and theological context is essential for deconstructing three attitudes: first, lingering anti-Judaism; second, Jesus as anti-Jew; and third, subtle “us versus them” dynamics. While denominations have repented of these attitudes, the fulfillment of that work remains to be done in individual pulpits, in Bible studies, and in human hearts. The more we get our theology and teaching right, the more space it creates for healing between Jesus and his own people.
Excerpted and adapted from “The Jew Named Jesus: Discover the Man and His Message,” (c) 2013 Rebekah Simon-Peter.
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Jan 12, 2015
The delightful New York Times bestseller Diary of a Wimpy Kid details Greg Hefley’s misadventures in Middle School as told through cartoon entries in his diary. He records his insights and questions, his frustrations and aspirations. He’s writing it now so one day when he’s rich and famous he can simply hand it to the paparazzi when they ask about his life. “Here’s my journal. Now shoo, shoo.”
Just like you can tell a lot about someone’s life by their diary so you can tell a lot about the life of a church by their prayers. It’s a window into the congregation’s values and concerns, hopes and fears.
I realize prayer requests are pretty personal stuff; I’m not trying to bash anyone. Still, it needs to be said: most prayers offered in most churches would classify our churches as wimpy. Yes, wimpy.
In the churches I attend and visit, the most commonly voiced prayer requests are for:
- People recovering from illness or surgery
- Their caregivers, or sometimes their survivors
- People traveling
- Communities hit by a natural disaster
- The US Military and their families
These kind of prayer requests make for a wimpy church; they keep us weak and ineffectual. I know I’m going out on a limb here and some of you may be offended. But stick with me.
I want to share with you how and why these kinds of prayers keep us wimpy, plus 3 ways to transform your church to strong, brave, and confident! Finally, I have 3 tips for how to make the transition gracefully.
The How and Why of It
In a word, our prayers tend to be about us: our health, our safety, our comfort.
Of course, no concern is unimportant to a loving, caring God. All of our individual worries, cares, and fears are burdens equally shared by God. That’s not the issue. That’s not what makes us wimpy.
Here is the issue: Our individual prayers for our health, safety and comfort generally constitute the sum total of the corporate prayers offered in worship as the body of Christ.
What’s wrong with that?
- We say that we are the hands and feet of Christ, who came for the whole creation, but our prayers reveal that we only care about us—specifically, our health, our safety, and our comfort. When did you last pray for the earth’s creatures? Or people groups you have never met?
- We say we want young people in our churches, but our prayers reveal we don’t care much about the world they live in or will lead. When did you last pray about the causes of teen suicide or the things that bring them joy?
- We say we follow Christ, but our prayers don’t sound much like his. He prayed for unity, strength under duress, God’s will above his own, God’s kingdom to come, right-sized sustenance, forgiveness for sins and debts as well as the ability to forgive others, guidance to resist temptation and for faith to increase among other things. Other than the Lord’s Prayer, do you pray these things?
Prayers that Transform
Ready for prayers that will make your church strong, bold and confident? If so, here are 3 strategies for you to try.
- Offer a pastoral prayer that addresses the concerns of the world in the past week. Read the newspaper or watch what topics are trending on Twitter, whether #blacklivesmatter; #iamcharliehebdo; #JeSuiJuif. Don’t shy away from praying about what the rest of the world is talking about.
- The world is in the midst of a new baby boom with the growth of the Digital and Millennial generations. What would make the world a better place for these young people to grow up in? Offer prayers that address those concerns.
- Read the Gospels to see what Jesus prayed. Begin to reflect his concerns in the corporate prayers of the church.
Likely you have been praying “us” prayers for a long time. It takes intentionality to make this shift. Here are 3 tips to help you make a smooth transition:
- Don’t pray off the top of your head. Instead, prepare ahead of time. Otherwise you are likely to default to prayers that focus on familiar themes. Ask Spirit for courage to sustain you in this new way of praying.
- Weave personal requests for comfort, health and safety into corporate prayers that reflect the needs of the world, the young, and Jesus’ own prayers.
- Understand many people in the congregation already have these wider concerns on their hearts and minds. But they are following your lead about what’s “acceptable” to lift up. Your wise words will embolden them.
Church, if we get these things right, then our prayers will no longer weaken our churches. Instead, they’ll make us stronger, braver and more confident! Then watch out. The word is likely to get out.
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Apr 16, 2014
Resurrection is the promise of Easter. The only trouble is no death, no new life! I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that new life is what I crave!
So this Holy Week, I thought I’d share with you the top 3 ways to avoid resurrection:
1. Refusal to let the old die out
I have seen too many ministries propped up or emotionally subsidized because they used to be successful. Or because they were someone’s pet project. Yet the current results or enthusiasm no longer warrant the resources to keep them going. They suck time, money and energy out of a church that might otherwise be used more effectively.
Here’s the trick: get comfortable with emptiness until something new surfaces.
2. Refusal to change
We’ll experience 20,000 years worth of change in this century alone. That means the church has to become more agile at embracing change simply to connect with our communities. Don’t mistake “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” with God or faith being static. Instead consider that Jesus is the ultimate expression of God’s ingenuity and creativity!
Go ahead put up a screen, get a Facebook account, create online giving options, and mentor the next generation into leadership!
3. Refusal to be uncertain
Jesus faced an unknown future. Would God let the cup of suffering pass or not? It took faith not to know. There’s lots of stuff we don’t know now…and can’t know. We’ll never know unless we trust God and life enough to take uncertain steps.
Give up having to be certain. Step out in faith! Try something you’re pretty sure might fail…just to see! Have an adventure. Build your faith muscle.
“Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.”
If you want to talk about how to embrace resurrection instead of avoid it, shoot me an email (re*****@***************er.com)!
Here’s to new life!
Rebekah
