REMEMBER...

THE GALILEAN and What He Took Seriously by Tom Colgan

As we study more intensely the ministry of a Galilean Jew named Jesus, we find that the thrust of his message and the ministry among his people and amidst his culture is something drastically different than the basic tenets of early Christian doctrines that centered on his identity as the Son of God and his role as a dying Savior for the sins of humanity. Even though these early Christian doctrinal interpretations have stood primal for almost 2,000 years and for many represent a summation of basic Christianity, it is an opportunity for progressive enlightenment to glimpse the difference from these doctrines and that which was at the center of Jesus' actual message to people. When we look at his actions, the people to whom he ministered, the injustices that he addressed, we can begin to see the focus of what he took seriously as the great needs of his day and of his society. It is possible to discover and glimpse a message that was given and received and that had great transformative effects. For any person who also sees and understands this person in ministry, Jesus, as the divine Son of God, involved in a human incarnation, how can it not be of absolute ultimate importance to attempt to grasp the essence of what he saw as important thrusts of ministry to take so seriously that he would give his life to see them being carried out? What would be the impact upon our understanding of Christianity, if we could catch a glimpse of what Jesus took seriously as the main content of his story of actual ministering to humanity? But such a meaningful glimpse does not come easily. Christians have always understood the incarnation to be about the full humanity of this historical person from Nazareth in Galilee. But we have also understood his identity to be additionally, as recognized later, the divine Son of God. Paul, who didn't know Jesus during his earthly ministry, and who started his own ministry several years afterward, wrote that God raised Jesus and it was the resurrection event that told us his real identity. The first gospel, written 40 years after the events, told us that the identity of Jesus was a secret during his ministry, but was really told at the time of his baptism. It is a most difficult task to balance one's understanding and comprehension of the humanity and divinity of Jesus, without losing the ability to see both, and mostly emphasizing only one aspect. It is especially hard to look and see fully his remarkable ministry within his own society and culture before the events we know as Passion Week, and before all that followed. Today, I want to point out that the ministry he had among his own people is something that should not be missed. It should be remembered. I believe, wholeheartedly, that Jesus, the historical Galilean, took his ministry very seriously. From the beginning, his attention was on those in his society who had become disenfranchised. Jesus saw huge groups of people who had been told they had no hope. I believe Jesus' focus for his ministry was seen, by him, as taking away the estrangement that these former outsiders had in their relationship with God.

In today's world, there is a general awareness and assessment of Jesus' earthly ministry in Galilee and the Jesus Experience of the crowds gathered around him, that Jesus had made God real and available for those who had been shoved to the fringes of society, those who had been pushed behind barriers that had separated them from God. Jesus removed those barriers with the truths he pronounced and the estrangement that had been there was taken away. The truths of Jesus and his ministry had replaced estrangement with a new sense of closeness to the divine. But, it is important to understand how this ministry was implemented. For years later, when Jesus' death upon the cross was seen as a sacrifice for peoples sins, that they might be restored in favor with God, it was seen as a continuation of his ministry to remove estrangement. To begin to grasp an understanding of Jesus' early ministry, we must first realize that the gospels and the writings of Paul tell us about what people thought of Jesus after his death. The first gospel was written some four decades after the events and the final gospel was more than seven decades following the times of Jesus. The gospels should never be understood and seen as a next day modern newspaper story of what happened. They proclaim the living Christ and the understandings that developed over that period of years. They tell us about the presence and impact of the living Christ in the life of the church and then work that reality into the narratives of Jesus, including the story of his ministry before his death. It becomes quite apparent that the understanding of the identity of Jesus as the divine Son of God and the Savior of the World, whose death on the cross was for the sins of humanity, was the central focus of what they thought was the most important truth for the Christian faith. It is important to realize that nothing in the early ministry of Jesus is able to be seen by the early followers, disciples, or even the later gospel writers, without looking through the lens of the violent death on the cross, sudden and catastrophic. In addition to this lens, there was the lens of the resurrection and continued presence of Jesus among the followers, and the lens of the theological interpretation of Jesus being the instrument and pathway for people to break the bonds that cause estrangement from God. All these powerful instruments that stand between people and the truth that they are viewing, make it virtually impossible to grasp even a simple glimpse of what was happening before the major events of death, resurrection, and interpretation. So, the stark reality is that Jesus, the divine Son of God, could come into history, into a time and place of society and culture. The incarnation could happen and take place. He could intensely devour the plight of his people, and using intuitive genius, grasp an understanding of the ideas and truths that were being proclaimed. He could do a breakdown in his mind of the problems and the wrongs that needed to be addressed, including major concepts of the characteristics of Gods love. He could see why injustice was being done. He could see the wrong concepts that were causing widespread groups of people to become disenfranchised. And he could see how new truths could lead people out of this problem, and solve their dilemmas. He could see revitalizing his whole nation by sharing the truth of a new paradigm of understanding, a new paradigm of seeing the possibility of going from God estrangement to a transforming reality of God-closeness. So, he could do all of this. And people still wouldnt be able to remember and grasp the remarkable importance of his work. It would be overshadowed by different later emphasis. Somehow, the influence of what was discovered later has hidden the powerful basic and revolutionary truth that Jesus saw as the central focus of his ministry. It is time to turn it around and let the incredible remarkable earthly ministry of Jesus be heard. He introduced new paradigms of truth into a society that was desperate for the content, the substance of his revelations. The people upon whom he aimed his ministry, were not interested in religion or in more personal attacks from those in religious circles. They had had enough of that

treatment. They would have scoffed at Jesus, at first. But as he persisted on, and told them new and different truths, they began to wonder. Some began to believe. People were transformed. Changes began to happen. And healing, happened, also. People began to recognize that they were close to someone who had the ear of God. Here was someone who had divine associations, he was close to God, and he was telling them messages of hope that their dismal lives could suddenly be totally different, and be filled with Gods presence, too, just like his life. When the tide of attention and response turned, when they listened and heard, the floodgates opened, and the news spread like wildfire, even in the first century. The people listened to his new revelations about God, and how God-closeness was a real possibility. And remember, these were people who had been estranged from God, perhaps, for most of their lives and had felt it mightily. Believing Jesus new truths about these rich possibilities of having a positive favor with God must have been a doorway to a totally different life. Imagine the difference in your zest with life. People who could barely walk, now found the ability to run. Life was changing right in front of friends who knew how desperate things had been. The enthusiasm for what could happen next must have made the people bubble with anticipation. Blood stirred. Hearts beat fast. Nerves tingled. And the people couldnt wait to bring others to see this man the next tomorrow. Jesus would have had a hard time getting started. But he knew the problem. These were people who had been out of favor with God, people to whom society had told that they would never be able to have favor with God again, and who were told that their present condition was a curse from God. They were under the powerful weight of Gods thumb, and they couldnt move, and never would be able to move again. Jesus had a message for them. Their alienation and estrangement from God could be overcome. He had a message of the possibility of God-closeness that would turn their lives around. It was a message totally different and almost the opposite of what tradition had taught them. It told of a new truth about an inclusive, loving God, whose love would reach to all people. There would be no more outsiders, if you would only hear this new truth. This could be your experience in your life. He proclaimed this God-closeness as a way to live. It was his own personal experience, and they could find it, too. Without brokerage, without waiting, it was there for them to be transformed. And they were. Jesus had a message. It was hard for people to hear at first. His message solved their problem. His message brought transformation. And suddenly, people who had never felt close to God, and who didnt even think it was possible, who had been told all their lives to fear and not even say Gods name, now felt a stirring realization that divine presence was close by. And it was all because of this man with the new message, this man, Jesus, who was so obviously close to God, himself. This was the Jesus Experience. Jesus understood the problem. It wasnt their deep sinful condition. It wasnt because they were so awful that a just and pure God couldnt stand them, and had condemned them to this life of hell forever. The problem was this was the truth they had been told all their lives, and it was the truth that was held up for all of society, so that everyone in society would be compelled to obedience. Jesus understood the problem. The old paradigm had fenced the people in to a position where this truth was accepted as their reality. No one thought outside these lines, outside this box, along different perspectives. And Jesus realized that all of his society needed a breakthrough. They needed to go down another road of thinking. They needed a new set of truths. The old paradigm

wasnt working and had created a reality that was as wrong as ancient interpretations of fire shadows on a cave wall in a Platonic analogy. New light was needed. This was what faced Jesus at the start of his ministry. Jesus had a mission. It was to deliver his message, his new paradigms, his new revelations, his disclosure of God, that could be called the greatest disclosure of God ever given. His message included these new truths about Gods characteristics, Gods love, Gods Spirit, and Gods Presence. It was a message about availability and accessibility of divine relationship. It was a message that could be summarized as a message about the reality of God-closeness. It was a revelation. It was new truth. It was a new vision of reality. It was a new paradigm that would rock the world of his listeners. He had to get their attention. He had to get them to listen. He had to get them to understand. He had to get them to comprehend that this was a new direction. He had to get them to see that it was a real possibility. He had to get them to discover it was a reality. And he had to get them to be willing to accept and allow the transformation of their lives to happen, that they earlier had thought was a complete impossibility. And he did it! Jesus completed this mission. He got his message across. It was received. It worked miracles. People were healed. People were transformed. And people were allowed to feel something very new, something society had told them could not happen. From a position of being estranged from God, feeling hated by God, being squashed in life under Gods powerful thumb, now they were feeling this amazing truth of Jesus, the truth of God-closeness. Ask any fundamentalist Christian or any conservative who loves the Bible what Jesus main message was and what mission he was trying to accomplish when he started his ministry among the outcasts of the world and they will look at you with complete puzzlement if you tell them it was to give a new paradigm of God-closeness to a world of people who were living under an old paradigm that asserted they were in a position of unchangeable God-estrangement. Ask them what the message of Jesus is and they will tell you that God has given his divine son to die for our sins that all who believe might have salvation and eternal life. Ask what Jesus mission was and a similar answer to die for the sins of the world might be the response. Our understanding today of the Jesus story may be good Pauline theology, but it doesnt come from what Jesus took seriously in his ministry. It doesnt come from his dynamic new vision for those who were part of his 1st century world. As impossible as it is for us to grasp this, it is easy to see how we can miss his paradigm shifting disclosures that could transform still today. Jesus knew it would be difficult to start a ministry, especially among these outcasts that he had chosen to serve. He knew their problem. They needed a new truth. They needed a reality that would erase what their old reality had been. That new reality was found in Jesus message about God, and the possibilities that existed for them, about which they knew nothing. Jesus took them from where they were in their thinking, explaining the old truths that were making their lives so hard, confronting their frustrations with being out of favor with God, and having no hope of that ever changing. And he told them that reality is different. He told them new reality, new truth that meant they did have hope. And not just hope, but certainty that they could be in Gods favor, and have the reality of his new truth of God-closeness. Jesus didnt tell them his identity. And I am sure he didnt tell them that something in the future was going to happen, a death, a sacrifice, and you should remember to believe, and all your

sins will be forgiven. His message was not his identity. It was not a future action. It was not about blood sacrifices to appease God or to gain forgiveness for sins. His message was a message of truths, new truths, truths that applied to their situations, to their lives. They were new paradigms replacing old paradigms that were suffocating them. Jesus was bringing to them a paradigm shift that would change everything for them. It was a great paradigm shift that rocked the world. What was that paradigm shift that rocked the world? What was the central paradigm given by Jesus to those unto whom he ministered? What was the new paradigm that transformed the lives of those who came into contact with Jesus? And would that be a paradigm that would still change the world today? The paradigm that was the centerpiece of the Jesus Experience was simply a major paradigm shift from God-estrangement to God-closeness. The paradigm centered on a new vision of Gods inclusive and unlimited love, Gods almost incomprehensible capacity to love, and the availability and accessibility of divine relationship. It was modeled by Jesus as The Way to live, with a God-focus, a God-centeredness, and a Godpresence. All this was available to be received, and without a need for the brokerage of any group, individual, or institution. And it rocked the world and lives of all those who encountered this Jesus Experience. Today's world is full of people who have heard the message from religious circles that they are sinners, in need of repentance. Their sins must be forgiven by God. And that can only happen if they become converted, become a Christian, believe in Jesus as Savior, through saying a prayer, signing a pledge, or reciting oaths while joining a church. People are told that this salvation event of conversion also keeps you from going to an eternal damnation in a fiery hell. And all who have not participated in this conversion are seen as outsiders, and are not in God's favor. The truth is that modern estrangement from God, amidst condemnation from the religious circles is not so different 2,000 years later. In this 21st century, the same message of the Jesus paradigm given by Jesus in the 1st century is still new and different than what most are used to hearing in many Christian circles. But listen and hear the simple dynamic message and realize that this is what Jesus was focusing on when he was doing dedicated ministry to those who were in need. The paradigm of Jesus, his paradigm of simple God-closeness and all it can mean could change people today. It could change a whole religion. It could change the world. The Jesus Paradigm, the major paradigm of his own ministry, this paradigm of God-closeness would bring a paradigm shift into the heart of 21st century Christianity if it could be heard. This shift would cause people to see a different Christian message. This paradigm shift could change the world. This kind of paradigm shift would change the world! Jesus started a real ministry. He understood the problems. He had a new vision. To grasp it, is to understand the new paradigms he was introducing. The Jesus Paradigm. It was given in his ministry before his death, before the resurrection event, and before decades of religious interpretation produced theological constructs that have become the foundation of powerful tradition. The Jesus Paradigm. Grasping it is an attempt to truly understand what Jesus took seriously in his ministry. Can we see it?