We’re almost there now. So let’s look back at the narrative arc of the Lent Sunday gospels. Their theme is Jesus’ claim to divinity and his identity as the Messiah of Israel and all the evidence that stacks up behind this claim.
We began in week 1 with Satan’s attempt to pervert Jesus’ mission, to redirect him into trivialities. How about a crowd-pleasing huckster who magics up food? A superman who performs deeds of daring-do? An overlord who holds the world in thrall?
There would be no world hunger with Magic Jesus and his all-you-can-eat buffet. He’d leap tall buildings to amuse us. And think of the Christ-led global dictatorship – a benevolent one, of course, with everyone legally compelled to love God and each other on pain of death.
This is what some people hankered after in Jesus’ time. The mismatch between this and what Jesus actually offered is what led to his trial, crucifixion, and death. Some people still hanker after these things. They want a church whose primary function is to relieve physical suffering, not to save souls.
They want religious expression that provides spiritual thrills rather than orienting them towards worshipping God the way he asked us to. And some crave a more macho messiah; a brawny Instagram Jesus with a ring-light and a lot of tough talk for wimps.
But instead in week 2, we saw “good old Jesus”, the man we thought we knew, transformed with divine light to make us look at him and ourselves more truthfully. The voice of God then confirmed to three witnesses that Jesus was his son and told them to listen to him.
Next, we saw a Jesus who was open enough to connect with a Samaritan woman with a dubious past, to the point of sending her back to her own village as a successful evangelist. Then we saw a Jesus who healed a blind man who didn’t even ask for healing and got him into quite a bit of trouble with important people.
Jesus himself tells the man that he is the “Son of Man” prophesied in the scriptures. The healed man calls him “Lord”, one of the titles of God, and worships him. This week, we see Jesus doing something that only the greatest prophets of Israel, Elijah and Elisha, had done. He raises a man who had been dead for days back to life.
Was this crowd-pleasing showmanship? Was it done to poke the important people in the eye? No. What Jesus wants – and he tells us this himself – is to stir up more faith in his disciples, some of whom are not entirely with the program. (And he is also hoping that Martha will tell him that she believes he is the Messiah, which happily she does.)
The narrative arc is all about Jesus’ divinity and authority. But all his victories have been small ones, just the hearts and minds of common people. These small victories have also seriously browned off the people who should have been the happiest to see him.
Are you satisfied with what’s on offer here? Do you believe that Jesus is who he says he is? Do you still want an alternative history when Jesus thrashes everyone, puts his foot on top of the planet, and solves all our problems?
Or are you one of those very educated people who hasn’t been listening for the last five weeks and still thinks that Jesus was just a nice man who died an avoidable martyr’s death?
If you want to celebrate Jesus’ resurrection at Easter, you might need to clear one last substantial obstacle from his path inside you. That is your personal lack of faith in him as God and Christ.
You say it every Sunday out loud. But do you really believe it? And if you do, then are you ready to take up your cross and follow him down an awkward, humiliating, and ultimately fatal road?
Of course not. None of us really wants that. But it’s what we signed up for – not Magic Jesus, Superman Jesus, or Instagram Jesus.
Jesus came into the world to die and rise again, so that he could continue to come into the world through each one of us and our good, positive, open connections with other people.
To get to the resurrection, Jesus must go through the Passion first. It’s the same for us. But if you have done your work this Lent on preparing the way of the Lord inside you, then you will have made his job a little bit easier.
