Our ancestors the Israelites suffered a terrible trauma six centuries before Jesus – the destruction of Jerusalem, its Temple, and the exile of much of its population to various cities in the Babylonian Empire. Two prophets – Jeremiah and Ezekiel – argued it was largely the failure of the kings to offer good example and exercise leadership. In speaking to the people, Ezekiel used a common metaphor for kings, shepherd.
In the light of past failures of shepherd, it was a bold move for Jesus to call himself a shepherd. But Jesus quotes a key sentence of Ezekiel, which rids the term of its negative history: “I myself [the Lord] will search for my sheep, and will seek them out. I will gather them . . . will feed them with good pasture…” Jesus contrasts himself with false and self-interested shepherds, whom he brands as thieves and robbers. Strong language from the mouth of Jesus, but prompted by his passionate love for the people. We know how angry we get if people we love are tricked and robbed. Jesus likewise.
Jesus compares himself to a shepherd in two different senses. He is the shepherd who enters through the gate and leads the sheep from the sheepfold to feed in the pasture. He knows their names and calls them one by one. The sheep follow him because they recognize his voice. We have the unforgettable picture of Jesus leading the sheep. In the early church, a frequent depiction of Christ was the Good Shepherd; its function was like a crucifix today.
The second image of Christ is the gate of the sheepfold, which may surprise us. This claim reminds us of Peter’s speech in the first reading, “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved.” We don’t know how God manages things differently for nations than ourselves, but for us Christians Jesus is the One. We should hear his voice alone, for as the gospel says, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”
Sometimes we hesitate to bring our needs to God. Why? Often the reasons are two: (1) we don’t think God is interested in us. We are too small, too unimportant; (2) we have been unfaithful in the past and can’t guarantee we won’t sin in the future. But both these attitudes are refuted by Jesus’s comparing his Shepherd’s love for us to the love Father and Son have for each other. They attend to each other, delight in each other, give themselves trustfully to each other. To say it’s “quality love” would be an understatement. It’s stronger and more consistent than anything we can imagine. So, when Jesus says to us, “I am the Good Shepherd,” he’s saying an astonishing and marvelous thing.
One verse in the Gospel of John, verse 3:16, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish, but might have eternal life,” has become a slogan, often emblazoned in placards displayed at sporting events. Why has this verse gained the attention of ordinary people who do normal things like cheering on their favorite team? The answer is that it compresses into a single sentence the entire gospel, and even reminds us of the grand narrative behind the gospel.
Today’s reading from the Gospel of John is a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus. Nicodemus seems to represent official Judaism; he is a Pharisee and “ruler of the Jews.” Though Nicodemus is a member of the Jewish establishment, he is impressed by Jesus and wants to learn more. Later on, Nicodemus will insist that Jesus be given a fair hearing and then, with Joseph of Arimathea, will courageously attend to Jesus’s burial.
In speaking to Nicodemus, Jesus seems to be addressing Judaism itself in a non-polemical and positive way. In contrast to the somewhat negative tone the Fourth Gospel uses to speak of the “the world,” Jesus here speaks of God’s immense love of the world as it actually is, not an idealized world of justice and peace, but the world that is resistant to God and characterized by darkness rather than light. This is the world that God loves, a world marred by pain, stupidity, hatred, sin and death. The good news is that we are in this world so loved by God. We do not have to earn God’s love. God does not avoid our flawed world, but comes into it and enables us to experience within it divine love in its fullness.
What response can we make to the light that God brings into the world we actually live in? The answer is given in the first line of the Gospel, “Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. “Lifted up” originally referred to the Israelites in the Exodus from Egypt who were bitten by desert serpents and then cured of the poison by gazing at the bronze serpent that Moses erected as an antidote. All who gazed upon it were healed. So, in the Gospel according to John, Jesus is the one “lifted up” in the crucifixion. If we look upon him with faith, we will be healed. As the biblical scholar Brendan Byrne remarked, “Confronting at one and the same time their own evil and supremely costly divine gift that takes it away, [people] come to know God revealed as Love, reaching out to draw them into the sphere of undying divine love.”
Mountains were sacred in the world that Israel inhabited. Remote and seldom visited, encircled by clouds, thunder, and rain, they were perfect homes of the majestic gods. The first reading, from Genesis, and the third, from the Gospel of Mark, show them to be places where the Lord encounters humans. A mountain is an apt site for Abraham’s sacrifice of his son Isaac. The story never fails to shock readers in contrast to the positively-viewed Transfiguration.
But if we consider the context of Abraham’s sacrifice, we can see that it too has a positive side, and teaches a valuable lesson. The very first verse in chapter 22, “God tested Abraham,” shifts attention from God to Abraham and reduces the dramatic tension. Moreover, God’s command to give up his son echoes the earlier command to Abraham in chapter 12 to give up his homeland. The final chapters repeat words from the opening chapters, “Go to the land” in both 12:1 and 22:2. The parallel between the opening and closing of the story shows that one must surrender one’s most precious things – a homeland, a beloved son – in order to receive them back enriched from the Lord. The theme of giving up one’s son appears twice more in Genesis: Judah is asked to give up his only son Selah to Tamar in chapter 38, and Jacob in chapter 43 is asked to give up his only remaining Rachel son Benjamin by allowing him to go to Egypt. In all these instances, the father receives his son back enriching his family. Christians will be reminded of John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that he gave [up] his only Son.” In short, one must read Genesis 22 with appreciation of its symbolism and its function in the large narrative.
The Gospel of Mark shows another scene on a mountain also with a shadow side, for the glorious Transfiguration also is preceded and followed by Jesus’s prediction of his coming passion and death in Jerusalem. It is an interesting that in the Book of Chronicles’ retelling of Abraham’s sacrifice, the mountain of Abraham’s sacrifice is identified as Jerusalem, a place of sacrificial offering.
What do these mountain appearances of the Lord teach us today? They display to us the sovereignty of God who makes a total claim on Abraham’s life, and a total claim on the three disciples. In the Transfiguration, Jesus enables his followers to make their own the story of Israel symbolized by Moses and Elijah.
The Lectionary raises two questions. What does Jesus mean by his announcement “The Kingdom of God is at hand” and why does he insist “Repent and believe in the Gospel?” What does Jesus mean by repent? The answer lies in understanding the meaning of the Kingdom of God. English “kingdom of God” is a bit misleading. In Jesus’ language of Aramaic, “kingdom” is an active noun and means “the ruling of God” or “the governing power of God,” which is a major theme of the Bible. According to the Bible, the Lord created the world and guides it toward its appointed end. Israel and the nations, despite their frequent attempts to wrest things to their own ends, cannot obstruct the Lord’s purpose. When Jesus uses the term “Kingdom of God” it is not new; he is simply describing the theme of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation.
What then is new in Jesus’ announcement? It is in the phrase “is at hand.” What does the phrase “is at hand” add to the phrase “kingdom of God?” Just this: the Lord’s governance of the world has taken a new turn. A new stage is dawning. God’s rule proceeds in stages. There was a period before the flood, a period after, the call of Abraham, the forming of Hebrew slaves into the nation of Israel, the Babylonian exile, and now there is the period of Jesus.
We have the answer to our question why Jesus insists that we “repent.” Because it is the last stage of the successive kingdoms of God. Each stage demands a particular response.
The English word “repent” may not be the best translation of Jesus’s command. Jesus probably would have said “turn!” and the early Christian missionaries would have translated it the word by the Greek verb metanoiete, lit. “change your mind!” or more freely, “look at things in a new way!” “Open yourself to the new thing God is going in your midst!” Jesus means that something so important has happened that people have to stop what they normally do, and pay careful attention to this new thing.
“Repent!” therefore is a good verb to open Lent. It allows Jesus to show us the Kingdom, to reveal himself in the resurrection, which is the most dramatic revelation of the rule of God over the world. We have probably asked ourselves more than once since Ash Wednesday–what will I do for Lent this year? There are many things–fasting, prayer, alms-giving–and all help us to look at Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
