The Courage to Stand Up to Harm
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The Courage to Stand Up to Harm
Herb Montgomery; March 14, 2025
If you’d like to listen to this week’s article in podcast version click on the image below:
Our reading this week is from the three temptations in the gospel of Luke:
At that time some Pharisees came to Jesus and said to him, “Leave this place and go somewhere else. Herod wants to kill you.”
He replied, “Go tell that fox, ‘I will keep on driving out demons and healing people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will reach my goal.’ In any case, I must press on today and tomorrow and the next day—for surely no prophet can die outside Jerusalem!
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing. Look, your house is left to you desolate. I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’” (Luke 13:31-35)
Our reading this week starts with a threat on Jesus’ life. This gives me pause in my own understanding of what Jesus and his gospel was all about. People don’t get killed for preaching a gospel that God loves people. People don’t get killed for passing out free tickets to heaven or assurance about the afterlife. These kinds of gospels rarely ever threaten the status quo or the powerful whom the status quo benefits.
In the Hebrew prophetic justice tradition, prophets were killed when they stood up to exploitative systems by speaking truth to power. John the Baptist was standing squarely in that tradition and was beheaded by Herod. Now, in this week’s reading, Herod’s sights are set on Jesus. And Jesus is boldly standing in the same prophetic justice tradition: a Galilean, Jewish prophet of the poor speaks truth to power once again.
One element that keeps the Jesus of this story relevant for me today is the courage we see here.
“Go tell that fox, ‘I will keep on driving out demons and healing people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will reach my goal.’”
Jesus calls Herod a fox. It makes me think of a fox in the hen house. Herod was a client king of Rome who exploited the population to enrich himself and the elites and powerful who, in exchange for their allegiance, were also being enriched. Speaking of a fox in the hen house, Jesus uses this imagery further when he says he wants to protect the people of Jerusalem as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings when the fox circles. The Temple State centered in Jerusalem had become deeply complicit in the harm that Rome was committing against the economically powerless and vulnerable. Jesus states that although he is working in Herod’s region, his ultimate aim is to go to Jerusalem and stage his protest there.
We who know the rest of the story know that Jesus did just that. He shows up at the Temple, flips the money tables in the courtyard, calls out those in power wielding harm, and, before the week is ended, the powerful and elite hang Jesus on a Roman cross.
Jesus also defines his activity in Herod’s region as “driving out demons and healing people.” If we sanitize or domesticate these activities, we will fail to understand why they would have provoked death threats from Herod and we will miss the meaning here entirely.
In the gospels, casting out demons is a coded way to speak to driving out Roman possession and oppression of the region and its inhabitants. In Mark, the name of the “demon” Jesus faced was Legion, the same name as the occupying, possessing Roman military unit in the area.
“Jesus asked him, ‘What is your name?’ ‘Legion,’ he replied.” (Luke 8:30)
Casting out demons meant exorcising Roman presence from Jewish societies.
This alone would make Herod’s death threats make sense. Liberating individuals from personal demons wouldn’t have even gotten Herod’s attention. But if Jesus was speaking out against Rome, this would have threatened Herod and his role and position with the empire. It would make Herod’s death threats make a lot of sense.
We must also see healing the people as more than physical. Jesus’ teaching was accompanied by healing for the people because his gospel of God’s just reign in the place of Rome’s was the undoing of the economic, political, social, and religious sickness Rome had brought to the masses in Galilee and Judea while enriching the elites at their expense.
Despite Herod’s threats, Jesus sets his sights on Jerusalem. He must take his gospel for the poor (Luke 4:18) to the very center of the system that is causing the harm. This reminds me of the saying about pulling people out of the river. If someone is drowning then by all means pull them out, but at some point you have to wander up stream and find out who keeps throwing all these people in the river to begin with! We must be about harm mitigation, but harm mitigation is not enough. Charity is not enough. At some point we must challenge the system that creates such a deep need for charity. This is the difference between feeding the poor, which is important, and asking why we have a system that creates poverty to begin with. That would not be simple bandaid solutions, but genuine systemic healing indeed.
Lastly, Jesus states that no prophet can die outside of Jerusalem. This statement alone gives us an idea of how far Jerusalem and her rulers had become enmeshed with Roman complicity in harm. Jerusalem had become known for silencing one way or another anyone who spoke out against the powerful: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you” (Matt 23:37). As the powerful did to the prophets of old, so the powerful also silenced contemporary prophets of justice. Think of the beheading of John. Jesus was following closely behind in his trajectory. Again, it is helpful to think of Jerusalem politically, as the capital city of that region and not strictly religious. Yes, religion was involved, as it was in everything. But Jesus’ denouncement is not against Judaism as a religion but against the temple state’s participation with the harm Rome was committing against the populace, participation enriching powerful people in Jerusalem who would be faithful to Rome.
All of this causes me to consider those today with the courage to speak out against harsh decisions and brutal acts being perpetrated in the name of government efficiency today. A chainsaw is quite metaphorically being taken to our system, all to grant benefits to wealthy elites who verbalize allegiance to our present administration in the U.S. At what cost? The dismantling of a system, and undeserving people harmed in its wake. And those who speak out now are also being targeted for doing so.
In our story, Jesus knew where his solidarity would lead. He knew that if he continued to speak out against the harm being perpetrated by the powerful, if he continued to stand in solidarity with the marginalized, the vulnerable, those most harmfully impacted by the decisions the powerful in his society were making, and if he called the entire populace back to fidelity to the God of the Torah with its economic justice (including the Torah’s periodic wealth redistribution and debt cancellation), he well knew that taking up the prophet’s role could garner him a prophet’s end. And this is why the Jesus story remains relevant for me in times like we are living through today. Jesus, knowing where his choices would lead, still had the courage to make those decisions and stand up for what was right for the people.
Today, many Christians (not all) are directly responsible for the political, social, and economic horizon we are looking out on in this nation. How would the Jesus of our reading this week respond to Christians who carry his name today being the very agents who have let a fox in the hen house to wreak havoc, chaos, and long lasting harm to so many? May those of us endeavoring to follow Jesus in our present moment be encouraged by the prophet we find in this week’s reading. A Jesus who named Herod for what he was. A Jesus who boldly refused to stop speaking truth about what was right. A Jesus who, setting his face toward Jerusalem, determined to go to the heart of the system in his commitment to God’s just future and making our world a safe, compassionate, just home for all. In the face of so many who are being harmed now, and for those for whom the next few years will bring untold harm, may we, too, find the same courage the Jesus of this week’s story showed.
Discussion Group Questions
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s podcast episode with your discussion group.
2. 2. What does saying “No” to injustice perpretrated by those in power look like for you? Share and discuss with your group.
3. What can you do this week, big or small, to continue setting in motion the work of shaping our world into a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone?
Thanks for checking in with us, today.
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Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
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I’ll see you next week.
New Episode of “Just Talking” Now Online!
Season 3, Episode 6: Luke 13.31-35. Lectionary C, Lent 2
Each week, we’ll be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend in the context of love, inclusion, and social justice. Our hope is that our talking will be “just” talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week we’ll be inspired to do more than just talking.
If you teach from the lectionary each week, or if you’re just looking for some thoughts on the Jesus story from a more progressive perspective within the context of social justice, check it out at:
New Episode of The Social Jesus Podcast
A podcast where we talk about the intersection of faith and social justice and what a first century, prophet of the poor from Galilee might have to offer us today in our work of love, compassion and justice.
This week:
Season 2 Episode 11: The Courage to Stand Up to Harm
Luke 13:31-35
All of this causes me to consider those today with the courage to speak out against harsh decisions and brutal acts being perpetrated in the name of government efficiency today. A chainsaw is quite metaphorically being taken to our system, all to grant benefits to wealthy elites who verbalize allegiance to our present administration in the U.S. At what cost? The dismantling of a system, and undeserving people harmed in its wake. And those who speak out now are also being targeted for doing so. In our story, Jesus knew where his solidarity would lead. He knew that if he continued to speak out against the harm being perpetrated by the powerful, if he continued to stand in solidarity with the marginalized, the vulnerable, those most harmfully impacted by the decisions the powerful in his society were making, and if he called the entire populace back to fidelity to the God of the Torah with its economic justice (including the Torah’s periodic wealth redistribution and debt cancellation), he well knew that taking up the prophet’s role could garner him a prophet’s end. And this is why the Jesus story remains relevant for me in times like we are living through today. Jesus, knowing where his choices would lead, still had the courage to make those decisions and stand up for what was right for the people. Today, many Christians (not all) are directly responsible for the political, social, and economic horizon we are looking out on in this nation. How would the Jesus of our reading this week respond to Christians who carry his name today being the very agents who have let a fox in the hen house to wreak havoc, chaos, and long lasting harm to so many? May those of us endeavoring to follow Jesus in our present moment be encouraged by the prophet we find in this week’s reading. A Jesus who named Herod for what he was. A Jesus who boldly refused to stop speaking truth about what was right. A Jesus who, setting his face toward Jerusalem, determined to go to the heart of the system in his commitment to God’s just future and making our world a safe, compassionate, just home for all. In the face of so many who are being harmed now, and for those for whom the next few years will bring untold harm, may we, too, find the same courage the Jesus of this week’s story showed.
Available on all major podcast carriers and at:
https://the-social-jesus-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/the-courage-to-stand-up-to-harm
Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political & Economic Teachings of the Gospels.
by Herb Montgomery
Available now on Amazon!
In Finding Jesus, author Herb Montgomery delves into the profound and often overlooked political dimensions of the gospels. Through meticulous analysis of biblical texts, historical context, and social discourse, this thought-provoking book unveils the gospels’ socio-political, economic teachings as rooted in a profound concern for justice, compassion, and the well-being of the marginalized. The book navigates the intersections between faith and societal justice, presenting a compelling argument for a more socially engaged and transformative Christianity.
Finding Jesus is not just a scholarly exploration; it is a call to action. It challenges readers to reevaluate their understanding of Christianity’s role in public life and to consider how the radical teachings of the gospels can inspire a renewed commitment to justice, equality, and compassion. This book is a must-read for those seeking a deeper understanding of the social implications of Christian faith and a blueprint for building a more just and inclusive society.
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