Holy Week has a special place in the life of the church. It marks a week like no other in our calendar when we wrestle with the meaning of Jesus’ death and resurrection.
There are two senses of the verb ‘to mean’. If I ask what CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement) means, I could be asking what the initials stand for or what a free trade agreement is. I may, however, be asking what you think the implications of CAFTA will be for
An oxymoron is a combination of contradictory or incongruous words or concepts. A list of oxymora could include: original copy, deafening silence, working vacation, government organization, Jumbo shrimp, virtual reality, reality television, democratic (or republican) leadership, Microsoft Works, French military, or corporate ethics. In the first century the term ‘crucified Messiah’ would be added to that list. A crucified Messiah was a failed Messiah, a self-deceived person who was put in his place by the Roman authorities; someone who got justice in the form of a cross. There were plenty of those types to go around when Jesus was traveling to and fro teaching on the
We catch the oxymoronic nature of a crucified Messiah in the last chapter of Luke. A certain unrecognizable man comes up to two other men walking from
Jesus had impressed many with his signs and wonders to the extent that some thought He could be
The great mystery of the birth of Christianity is how we move from, ‘but we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel’, from Jesus’ followers abandoning him and denying association with him, from His followers locking themselves in a room for fear (John 20.19), to what we see happening in the Book of Acts—His followers fearlessly preaching the message concerning Jesus, risking their jobs, social status and lives in order to remain loyal to Jesus; to statements like ‘we preach Christ crucified’ (1 Cor.1.23) or ‘far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ’ (Gal. 6.14)? What can explain this drastic change in the followers of Jesus? Judas the Galilean, a self-proclaimed Messiah who led a revolt in 6 AD did not spark a movement after he was squashed by the Romans; after his humiliating defeat His followers did not proclaim him to be Messiah. Theudas, a Jewish magician who gathered followers to the river
In a word—the resurrection! As Paul writes in Romans, Jesus was declared or appointed to be the Son of God, a Messianic title, ‘by his resurrection from the dead’ (Rom. 1.4). But how does the resurrection make Jesus the Messiah?
Before we jump to preconceived conclusions, it may come as a surprise to learn that in the first century, if someone were to say, 'I will be raised from the dead', this would not make him unique or strange, and it would certainly not be a messianic claim, nor a claim of deity. Many Jews in the first century expected to be raised from the dead. We see in several Jewish texts around the time of Jesus’ ministry that many Jews expected their bodies to be reassembled as a sign of their faithfulness to the one true God. There is an illustrative passage in 2 Mac 7 where seven brothers are brought before the pagan king and told to renounce their loyalty to YHWH by eating a piece of pork. The second brother, after seeing his first fried in a pan, responded: “You accursed wretch, you dismiss us from this present life, but the King of the universe will raise us up to an everlasting renewal of life, because we have died for his laws.”[1] The third brother responded in a similar manner. The text reads: “When it was demanded, he quickly put out his tongue and courageously stretched forth his hands, 11 and said nobly, ‘I got these from Heaven, and because of his laws I disdain them, and from him I hope to get them back again.’”[2] The fourth brother responded equally with hope in the resurrection: “One cannot but choose to die at the hands of mortals and to cherish the hope God gives of being raised again by him. But for you there will be no resurrection to life!”[3]
I should mention that I am not quoting these passages from 2 Mac because I consider them authoritative; I don’t. I quote 2 Mac because it serves as a window; it allows us to understand the hopes and expectations of Jews living during Jesus’ ministry. 2 Mac and other texts like it demonstrate that many Jews understood resurrection from the dead as vindication for their suffering, a sign that God has approved of them and has accepted their lives as sacrifices.[4]
Most Jews loathed their Roman overlords; they were tired of being oppressed by first,
So what happens when a man who claimed and did amazing things, who spoke of liberation, who as we see in Luke and Mark very much connected His ministry with the message of Isaiah, who spoke of his death as a renewal of the covenant, as the ransoming of people from their sins and of establishing God’s kingdom anew--what happens when he is killed by the Roman government and then is raised from the dead? This really messes with the expectations! As is often the case when God acts, there was simply no category for this! In John 20.9 we get John’s editorial comment after the news that Jesus was missing from the tomb, 'They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.”
Nevertheless, after forty days of post-resurrection meetings with Jesus, the first followers of Jesus concluded that Jesus’ resurrection was a sign of God’s approval of all that Jesus taught and did; Jesus’ words and deeds were vindicated by the Father through the resurrection. We see this at Pentecost, the text we will be reflecting upon today.
After Jesus had been raised from the dead He appeared to a group of his followers over a period of forty days speaking to them about the
12 Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, “What does this mean?” 13 Some, however, made fun of them and said, “They have had too much wine.” 14 Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in
What is Peter’s point? He is answering the question, ‘what does this mean?’ in verse 13 by quoting a passage from Joel 2.28-32 where the last days will be signaled by God pouring out His Spirit. The ‘last days’ refer to the time when God will intervene to restore
A first century Jew might object to this line of thinking and retort, 'But, where is the Messiah? This restoration can’t be inaugurated without the Messiah'. And that is precisely Peter’s next point. The Messiah has come, has been crucified, and yet lives again—and the resurrection proves it:
v. 23-24 ‘this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed…God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.
In verses 25-34 Peter then uses Ps. 16 and argues that it can’t refer to David, since his body has seen corruption. Peter thus interprets David to be speaking of the resurrection of the Messiah (Christ). In other words, God will raise up His Messiah from the dead and he will be exalted at the right hand of God. This is vindication language. To be seated at the right hand of God is among many things, a way of saying that God has accepted Jesus’ life, teachings, deeds and sacrificial death via crucifixion.
What is the point of all this? God has made this crucified Jesus both Lord and Christ, Messiah. Crucified Messiah is not an oxymoron anymore! Jesus has been accepted by God and as a result He (Jesus) has poured out the Holy Spirit upon His people, a sign that the last days are upon us.
Thus, we see in this first Christian sermon ever preached that the resurrection of Jesus was the key sign that He indeed was sent from God, that His message and deeds, even His death on a cross, were part of God’s plan. This is why resurrection is the key element in almost every teaching moment in Acts:
3.13-15 “The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus. You handed him over to be killed, and you disowned him before Pilate, though he had decided to let him go. You disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you. 15 You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this.
3.25-26 “And you are heirs of the prophets and of the covenant God made with your fathers. He said to Abraham, ‘Through your offspring all peoples on earth will be blessed.’ c 26 When God raised up his servant, he sent him first to you to bless you by turning each of you from your wicked ways.”
4.1-2 The priests and the captain of the temple guard and the Sadducees came up to Peter and John while they were speaking to the people. 2 They were greatly disturbed because the apostles were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection of the dead.
4.33 With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus
10.39-43 “We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in
13.26-39 “Brothers, children of Abraham, and you God-fearing Gentiles, it is to us that this message of salvation has been sent. 27 The people of
32 “We tell you the good news: What God promised our fathers 33 he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm:
“‘You are my Son; today I have become your Father. b ’ c
34 The fact that God raised him from the dead, never to decay, is stated in these words:
“‘I will give you the holy and sure blessings promised
to David.’ d 35 So it is stated elsewhere: “‘You will not let your Holy One see decay.’ e
36 “For when David had served God’s purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his fathers and his body decayed. 37 But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay. 38 “Therefore, my brothers, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you.
17.24-31 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. 26 From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. 27 God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ 29 “Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by man’s design and skill. 30 In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. 31 For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead.”
24.21 It is concerning the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial before you today.
25.18 Festus: When his accusers got up to speak, they did not charge him with any of the crimes I had expected. 19 Instead, they had some points of dispute with him about their own religion and about a dead man named Jesus who Paul claimed was alive.
26.6-8, 22-23
Paul to Agrippa: And now it is because of my hope in what God has promised our fathers that I am on trial today. 7 This is the promise our twelve tribes are hoping to see fulfilled as they earnestly serve God day and night. O king, it is because of this hope that the Jews are accusing me. 8 Why should any of you consider it incredible that God raises the dead?... 22 But I have had God’s help to this very day, and so I stand here and testify to small and great alike. I am saying nothing beyond what the prophets and Moses said would happen— 23 that the Christ b would suffer and, as the first to rise from the dead, would proclaim light to his own people and to the Gentiles.”
In the book of Acts it is clear that the resurrection of Jesus from the dead is crucial to their belief that He was in fact God’s appointed savior, Messiah, redeemer. For the first Christians, the resurrection vindicated all that Jesus taught and did. I want to end this reflection by asking, then, what exactly was vindicated? What did Jesus teach and do?
We get a large picture of what Jesus was doing by looking at his symbolic actions:
1. He called twelve disciples to be with Him. Why twelve? This was symbolic of the reconstituted
2. He ate with ‘sinners’. As is seen in Lk 19, this is interpreted by such sinners as a act of forgiveness, of Jesus accepting them and inviting them to be a part of what he was doing.
3. He healed the sick, cast out demons. In Isaiah, God’s agent who was to come to restore God’s people would also bring with him healing and domination of the demons.
4. He provocatively overturned table in the temple courts. This symbolic action pronounced God’s judgment upon the temple and its leadership. The temple, the place where God was said to abide, was being replace by Jesus.
5. And, most intriguing of all, He held a separate Passover meal where there was no lamb, and where he connected the Exodus story where God liberated His people from Egypt with His own soon-to-come death.
Jesus’ symbolic acts were communicating as much and perhaps even more than any words could do. He was saying to Israel that He was God’s agent, His approved son; that their was a new way to be God’s people and one can only learn this new way from Him; and that it was necessary for Him to come and pay for our sins.
God raised Jesus from the dead and not only vindicated His symbolic actions, but also what He taught. Let’s take just a moment and remember how Jesus’ interpreted His own death.
1. 10.11-14
11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 The hired hand is not the shepherd who owns the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. 13 The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. 14 “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me— 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. 17 The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”
2. Mark 10.45
Jesus has just explained to his disciples three times that He fully intends to go to
“The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
It is clear from the context of the Gospel of Mark that Jesus is here defining His sacrificial death in the light of the Servant Song of chapter 53 in Isaiah:
See, my servant…He was despised and rejected by men…4 Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.
6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all… Yet it was the Lord ’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the Lord makes f his life a guilt offering, he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand. 11 After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light of life g and be satisfied h ; by his knowledge i my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities. 12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great, j
and he will divide the spoils with the strong, because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
3. Mt. 26.26-29 (His interpretation of the Last Supper)
26 While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take and eat; this is my body.” 27 Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you. 28 This is my blood of the b covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. 29 I tell you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father’s kingdom.”
4. First Christians understood His death as sacrificial offering for forgiveness of sins:
a. Eph. 5.1-2: Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children 2 and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
b. Heb. 9.11-12, 25-28 : 11 When Christ came as high priest of the good things that are already here, a he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not man-made, that is to say, not a part of this creation. 12 He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the
c. 1 John 4.10: This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for b our sins.
d. 1 Peter 1.18-21: 18 For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. 20 He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake. 21 Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God.
OK, so Jesus understood His death as a sacrificial atonement, as a way to appease God’s wrath, as punishment in our place. But, it is one thing to claim this and another to actually do it! So how do we know that Jesus’ sacrificial death was atoning? How do we know that when we hope in Jesus, that when we trust in His substitutionary death, we are in fact hoping in God? As it says in 1 Pt 1.21, because God raised Him from the dead! Jesus’ suffering is vindicated!
Conclusion
What does the resurrection of Jesus mean? What does it tell us about Jesus?
1. When we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus we celebrate the fact that all that He said and did, most especially his sacrificial, atoning death, were accepted by God the Father. The resurrection says YES, AMEN to all that Jesus said and did!
2. When we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus we celebrate the fact that our sins really are forgiven—regardless of how we feel! How do we know? The resurrection! God has accepted Christ’s payment in full. Once He had paid for the full penalty, then He was free to go. His resurrection shows that the Father accepted the payment of Jesus for our sins. If Jesus remained dead it would mean that His death was not sufficient payment for sins, but that He was suffering judgment for His own sins. In being raised, however, it means that He had no sin. His death was not for His sins but for the sins of others. As Paul puts it, He “was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.” [R 4.25]
[1]2 Mac 7.9
[2] 2 Mac 7.10-11
[3] 2 Mac 7.14
[4] See also Wisdom of Sol. 3.1-12; 1 Enoch 22.13; 46.6; 51.1-2; 62.15; Ps.Sol. 3.11-16; 13.9-11; 14.4-10; 15.12-15 for more examples of this concept.
a Joel 2:28-32
b Or of those not having the law (that is, Gentiles)
c Psalm 16:8-11
d Or Messiah. ``The Christ” (Greek) and ``the Messiah” (Hebrew) both mean ``the Anointed One”; also in verse 36 .
c Gen. 22:18 ; 26:4
b Or have begotten you
c Psalm 2:7
d Isaiah 55:3
e Psalm 16:10
b Or Messiah
f Hebrew though you make
g Dead Sea Scrolls (see also Septuagint); Masoretic Text does not have the light of life.
h Or (with Masoretic Text) He will see the result of the suffering of his soul | and be satisfied
i Or by knowledge of him
j Or many
b Some manuscripts the new
a Some early manuscripts are to come
b Or as the one who would turn aside his wrath, taking away
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