A Gospel About the Living Rather than the Dead
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A Gospel About the Living Rather than the Dead
Herb Montgomery | Novembrer 7, 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 gospel of Luke:
Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him and asked him a question, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; the first married, and died childless; then the second and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had married her.”
Jesus said to them, “Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage; but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. Indeed they cannot die anymore, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection. And the fact that the dead are raised Moses himself showed, in the story about the bush, where he speaks of the Lord as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.” (Luke 20:27-38)
Our reading this week involves a long-standing disagreement between the Pharisees and the Sadducees regarding the resurrection. Luke’s Jesus aligns with the Pharisees in this argument by affirming the idea of a resurrection, but then escapes a Sadducean trap set for those who believed in a resurrection. The style of the story they told Jesus reflects the style of the debates of rabbis at the time Luke’s gospel was written and is consistent with the way Jesus typically responds to tricky questions in Luke’s stories. At that time, Pharisees did not teach that a person went directly to a heavenly abode at death as some Christians would later come to teach. Jesus’ Jewish society was far from univocal on what happens to a person after this life. Luke’s gospel also includes the story of the rich man and Lazarus, a story that reflects a view of the afterlife influenced heavily by Jewish Hellenism. In our story this week, Jesus sides with a Jewish idea that says all dead people, regardless of the type of life they lived, rest at death in Sheol, the inescapable abode where those who have died have no conscious existence. This belief later evolved into a resurrection of both the righteous and the unrighteous on a day in the future when all injustice, oppression, and violence would be put right (see Daniel 12:2).
The phrase that jumps out at me most in our reading is “God is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living.” The contrast between focusing on the living rather than on death and dying could have many possible applications today. To be sure, managing people’s fear of death has been a significant preoccupation for many religions. In the Christian faith, for example, the promise of heaven is powerful because it can be comforting. But focusing solely on personal salvation and the afterlife can replace focusing on Jesus’ teachings that call us to heal and put right the world around us while we live. Christianity teaches not only about the life to come but also about how Jesus followers are to live here and now. Justice in this life is not a secondary concern, but is central to Jesus’ teachings in the gospel stories.
One of Jesus’ core messages was the importance of loving one’s neighbor and caring for the least among us. In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus makes this clear when he says, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me” (Matthew 25:40). This passage defines following Jesus as action. It suggests that a genuine embrace of Jesus’ vision for society (“the kingdom”) manifests in acts of compassion, justice, and love toward others. A life focused only on securing a place in heaven or what may happen to us when we are dead risks neglecting Jesus’ call to be salt and light in our world while we are living (Matthew 5:13-16).
Being “salt and light” in our world here and now means Jesus followers are to influence the world positively by reflecting Jesus core ethic—love of neighbor—through their actions. Loving one’s neighbor in this life can express itself in many ways. It can include opposing unjust economic systems that plunge people into and keep them in poverty. It’s unacceptable that anyone should be hungry in the richest country in the world. The U.S. growing wealth disparity continues to worsen every day. Love of neighbor can also include seeking justice, which leads to peace, in other areas, too: justice in regards to racism, xenophobia, ableism, gender disparities, LGBTQ rights, and more. Working to shape our world into a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone is how Jesus followers testify to the power of Jesus’ gospel of love. To be clear, these actions don’t earn our individual salvation, but they are the ways through which we bring social salvation into being.
When Christians focus on doing justice in this world, they embody Jesus’ kingdom of God on earth. Jesus often spoke of the “kingdom of heaven” not as a distant place but as a present reality breaking into our world. Every act of kindness, every instance of compassion, and every effort toward justice manifests God’s just future and invites others into it today. The Christian life is not meant to be lived in isolation while we wait for death but in active engagement with the world while we are alive. After all, God is the God of the living and not the dead.
Focusing on our present life also guards against societal complacency and selfishness. A heaven-only paradigm can lead to an inward-looking faith concerned more with personal, individual assurance than community responsibility. But from the very beginning, Christianity has been a communal faith, one where love for God is not in competition with love for neighbor but inseparably connected, one manifesting the other. Following Jesus means working toward justice now as an act of obedience to the love of God, and, in tangible ways that benefit both ourselves and others, loving our neighbors as ourselves.
While the hope of heaven has historically been central to Christian belief, it still should never overshadow Jesus’ call to follow Him in how we relate to our world while we are in this life. Working toward a just world here and now is therefore central to discipleship. Through actions Jesus modeled himself in the gospel stories, Christians not only witness to the truth of Jesus’ love of neighbor but also bring hope, healing, and justice to a world in need. Jesus didn’t live to simply tell us God loved us. He spent his life teaching and modeling for us how to love one another.
“We belong to a mutually beneficial web of connection, well-being, and love. At the root of this connection is empathy; the result is kindness, compassion, respect, and understanding. When religion doesn’t center on this mutuality, it can become one of the toxic narratives that, in the end, dismantles self-love.” (Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis, Fierce Love, p. 30)
The questions about the afterlife that we encounter in this week’s reading are a distraction from focusing on living just lives while we’re alive. It’s interesting that these questions came from the Sadducees, the wealthy and elite class of Jesus’s society who had the most to lose if the masses embraced Jesus’ economic call for wealth redistribution such as through the Torah’s year of Jubilee (see Luke 4:19). Could this question, part of a debate between the Pharisees and and Sadducees, have been meant to distract from the concrete, economic elements of Jesus’ gospel? Could this have been another example of that age old political tactic of seeking to sow division among the masses over a peripheral topic to divide their support of Jesus?
Jesus’ response that God is the God of the living and not the dead calls each of us today to focus on uniting in our focus on the life in front of us, and shaping our current world into a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone today rather than on endless metaphysical debates about what may or may not happen to us in an afterlife.
Jesus’ mantra calls to me this week to focusing today. What difference can we make now?
Discussion Group Questions
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s podcast episode with your discussion group.
2. What difference does focusing on this life make in your own Jesus following and justice work? 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.
I want to say a special thank you to all of our supporters out there. And if you would like to join them in supporting Renewed Heart Ministries’ work you can do so by going to renewedheartministries.com and clicking donate.
My latest book Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political and Economic Teachings of the Gospels is available now on Amazon in paperback, Kindle and also on Audible in audio book format.
As always, you can find Renewed Heart Ministries each week on Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram and Meta’s Threads. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts.
Thank you for listening to The Social Jesus Podcast. If you enjoyed this podcast please take a moment to like and subscribe and if the podcast platform you’re using offers this option, please leave us a positive review. This helps others find our podcast as well.
If you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week.
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 45: A Gospel About the Living Rather than the Dead
Luke 20:27-38
“While the hope of heaven has historically been central to Christian belief, it still should never overshadow Jesus’ call to follow Him in how we relate to our world while we are in this life. Working toward a just world here and now while we are alive is therefore central to discipleship. The questions about the afterlife that we encounter in this week’s reading are a distraction from focusing on living just lives while we’re alive. It’s interesting that these questions came from the wealthy and elite class of Jesus’s society who had the most to lose if the masses embraced Jesus’ economic call for wealth redistribution such as through the Torah’s year of Jubilee? Could this have been another example of that age old political tactic of seeking to sow division among the masses over a peripheral topic to divide their support of justice? Jesus’ response that God is the God of the living and not the dead calls each of us today to focus on uniting in our focus on the life in front of us rather than on endless metaphysical debates about what may or may not happen to us in an afterlife.”
Available on all major podcast carriers and at:
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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Free Sign Up Here
The Original Good News of Easter
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The Original Good News of Easter
Herb Montgomery; April 19, 2025
If you’d like to listen to this week’s article in podcast version click on the image below:
Our reading this Easter is from the gospel of Luke:
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ” Then they remembered his words.
When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles. But they did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense. Peter, however, got up and ran to the tomb. Bending over, he saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and he went away, wondering to himself what had happened. (Luke 24:1-12)
The cross has been the symbol of salvation in Christian history for two millennia. The apostle Paul was among the first to define the good news as being about Jesus’ death. Before Paul, there are signals in our sacred texts that the good news was not originally that Jesus was crucified but that the Jesus whom the Romans had crucified was alive! The original good news was not the cross. It was the resurrection.
Let’s take a look at some of those early texts. We’ll start in the book of Acts. Notice in each of these verses what the theme of their gospel was.
With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. (Acts 4.33)
You crucified and killed by the hands of those outside the law. But God raised him up, having freed him from death, because it was impossible for him to be held in its power. (Acts 2.22-24)
This Jesus God raised up, and of that all of us are witnesses. (Acts 2.32-33)
You handed over and rejected in the presence of Pilate, though he had decided to release him. But you rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer given to you, and you killed the Author of life, but God raised from the dead. (Acts 3.12-16)
Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, but whom God raised from the dead. (Acts 4.10-11)
With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God’s grace was so powerfully at work in them all. (Acts 4:33)
The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree. (Acts 5.30-32)
They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day. (Acts 10.36-43)
Even though they found no cause for a sentence of death, they asked Pilate to have him killed. When they had carried out everything that was written about him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb. But God raised him from the dead . . . And we bring you the good news that what God promised to our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising Jesus. (Acts 13.35-38)
Why does this matter?
Christian theologians from multiple marginalized communities have spent years critiquing a theology that centers the good news on Jesus’ suffering rather than God’s triumph over suffering by undoing, overturning, and reversing that death. A theology that defines suffering as good news has real life negative consequences. This week I want to amplify some of these voices once again because they are worthy of our most concentrated attention.
Consider these observations from feminist scholars Joanne Carlson Brown and Rebecca Parker:
“It is not the acceptance of suffering that gives life; it is commitment to life that gives life. The question, moreover, is not Am I willing to suffer? but Do I desire fully to live? This distinction is subtle and, to some, specious, but in the end it makes a great difference in how people interpret and respond to suffering.” (Christianity, Patriarchy and Abuse, p.18, edited by Joanne Carlson Brown & Carole R. Bohn)
“Jesus did not choose the cross. He chose to live a life in opposition to unjust, oppressive cultures….Jesus chose integrity and faithfulness, refusing to change course because of threat.” (Christianity, Patriarchy and Abuse, p. XX; edited by Joanne Carlson Brown & Carole R. Bohn) Brown and Parker, For God So Loved the World?)
“Such a theology has devastating effects on human life. The reality is that victimization never leads to triumph. It can lead to extended pain if it is not refused or fought. It can lead to destruction of the human spirit through the death of a person’s sense of power, worth, dignity. or creativity. It can lead to actual death.” (Christianity, Patriarchy and Abuse, p. XX; edited by Joanne Carlson Brown & Carole R. Bohn)
Womanist scholar Katie G. Cannon writes similarly in the introduction to Delores S. Williams’ Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk:
“Theologians need to think seriously about the real-life consequences of redemptive suffering, God-talk that equates the acceptance of pain, misery, and abuse as the way for true believers to live as authentic Christian disciples. Those who spew such false teaching and warped preaching must cease and desist.” (Introduction)
Williams correctly states that the synoptic gospels place the emphasis of the good news on Jesus’ resurrection in triumph over the cross as a response to the powers that be seeking to silence Jesus’ teachings on the kingdom:
“Matthew, Mark and Luke suggest that Jesus did not come to redeem humans by showing them God’s ‘love” manifested in the death of God’s innocent child on a cross erected by cruel,
imperialistic, patriarchal power. Rather, the texts suggest that the spirit of God in Jesus
came to show humans life . . . The response to this invitation by human principalities and powers was the horrible deed the cross represents— the evil of humankind trying to kill the ministerial vision of life in relation that Jesus brought to humanity. The resurrection does not depend upon the cross for life, for the cross only represents historical evil trying to defeat good. The resurrection of Jesus and the flourishing of God’s spirit in the world as the result of resurrection represent the life of the ministerial vision gaining victory over the evil attempt to kill it.” (Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk, p. 130)
In her book Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God, Kelly Brown Douglas writes of the force of the resurrection with specific emphasis on how evil is defeated in the gospels stories:
“The resurrection is God’s definitive victory over crucifying powers of evil. Ironically, the power that attempts to destroy Jesus on the cross is actually itself destroyed by the cross. The cross represents the power that denigrates human bodies, destroys life, and preys on the most vulnerable in society. As the cross is defeated, so too is that power. The impressive factor is how it is defeated. It is defeated by a life-giving rather than a life-negating force. God’s power, unlike human power, is not a “master race” kind of power. That is, it is not a power that diminishes the life of another so that others might live. God’s power respects the integrity of all human bodies and the sanctity of all life. This is a resurrecting power. Therefore, God’s power never expresses itself through the humiliation or denigration of another. It does not triumph over life. It conquers death by resurrecting life. The force of God is a death-negating, life-affirming force. This is significant in two ways. The black feminist literary artist and social critic Audre Lorde once said, “The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us to temporarily beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change.” What the crucifixion–resurrection event reveals is that God does not use the master’s tools. God does not fight death with death. God does not utilize the violence exhibited in the cross to defeat deadly violence itself. As Lorde suggest, while this may bring a temporary solution, it does not bring an end to the culture of death itself. Rather, one stays entrapped in that very culture. The culture of death is thus granted power over life. As such, “only the most narrow parameters of change are possible and allowable.” If indeed the power of life that God stands for is greater than the power of death, then this must be manifest in the way God triumphs over death-dealing powers. The freedom of God that is life requires a liberation from the very weapons utilized by a culture of death. In other words, these weapons cannot become divine weapons. This liberation was foreshadowed by Jesus’ refusal to cooperate with the powers of death at the time of his crucifixion. The culmination of this liberation is Jesus’ resurrection. (Kelly Brown Douglas, Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God, p. 182-183)
The earliest form of the good news, good news that we still need today, is not that death brings life. But that
- Empire doesn’t have the last word.
- There is a larger universe than that created by oppressors.
- As powerful as death is, life is even more powerful.
- This present moment doesn’t last forever.
- Injustice doesn’t have to win.
- Justice will continue to strive even in the face of of the deepest obstruction.
- The universe can be bent toward justice.
- Hope is a discipline that is worth it.
I’ll close this week with Joanne Brown’s and Rebecca Parker’s deep insights about the difference between a gospel that focuses on someone’s dying, even Jesus’ dying, and a gospel that focuses on the power of resurrected life to triumph and undo everything accomplished through death and injustice:
“Suffering is never redemptive, and suffering cannot be redeemed. The cross is a sign of tragedy. God’s grief is revealed there and everywhere and every time life is thwarted by violence. God’s grief is as ultimate as God’s love. Every tragedy eternally remains and is eternally mourned. Eternally the murdered scream, Betrayal. Eternally God sings kaddish for the world. To be a Christian means keeping: faith with those who have heard and lived God’s call for justice, radical love, and liberation; who have challenged unjust systems both political and ecclesiastical; and who in that struggle have refused to be victims and have refused to cower under the threat of violence, suffering, and death. Fullness of life is attained in moments of decision for such faithfulness and integrity. When the threat of death is refused and the choice is made for justice, radical love, and liberation, the power of death is overthrown. Resurrection is radical courage. Resurrection means that death is overcome in those precise instances when human beings choose life, refusing the threat of death. Jesus climbed out of the grave in the Garden of Gethsemane when he refused to abandon his commitment to the truth even though his enemies threatened him with death. On Good Friday, the Resurrected One was Crucified.” (For God So Loved the World?)
Discussion Group Questions
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s podcast episode with your discussion group.
2. What does the good new of the resurrection mean to you this year? 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.
I want to say a special thank you to all of our supporters out there. And if you would like to join them in supporting Renewed Heart Ministries’ work you can do so by going to renewedheartministries.com and clicking donate.
My latest book Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political and Economic Teachings of the Gospels is available now on Amazon in paperback, Kindle and also on Audible in audio book format.
As always, you can find Renewed Heart Ministries each week on Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram and Meta’s Threads. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts.
Thank you for listening to The Social Jesus Podcast. If you enjoyed this podcast please take a moment to like and subscribe and if the podcast platform you’re using offers this option, please leave us a positive review. This helps others find our podcast as well.
You can watch our YouTube show each week called “Just Talking”. Each week, Todd Leonard and I take a moment to talk about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading 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 you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it. You can find JustTalking each week on YouTube at youtube.com/@herbandtoddjusttalking.
Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment.
And if you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week.
New Episode of “Just Talking” Now Online!
Lectionary Readings in the context of Love, Inclusion, & Social Justice
Season 3, Episode 10: Luke 24.1-12. Lectionary C, Easter 1
Each week, we’ll discuss the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend in the context of love, inclusion, and justice. We hope that our talking will be “just” talking (as in justice) and that we’ll be inspired to do more than “just talking” during our brief conversations each week.
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.
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 16: The Original Good News of Easter
Luke 24:1-12
“The cross has been the symbol of salvation in Christian history for two millennia. The apostle Paul was among the first to define the good news as being about Jesus’ death. Before Paul, there are signals in our sacred texts that the good news was not originally that Jesus was crucified but that the Jesus whom the Romans had crucified was alive! The original good news was not the cross. It was the resurrection. Christian theologians from multiple marginalized communities have spent years critiquing a theology that centers the good news on Jesus’ suffering rather than God’s triumph over suffering by undoing, overturning, and reversing that death. The earliest form of the good news, good news that we still need today, is not that death brings life. But that Empire doesn’t have the last word. There is a larger universe than that created by oppressors. As powerful as death is, life is even more powerful. This present moment doesn’t last forever. Injustice doesn’t have to win. Justice will continue to strive even in the face of of the deepest obstruction. The universe can be bent toward justice. Hope is a discipline that is worth it.”
Available on all major podcast carriers and at:
https://the-social-jesus-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/the-original-good-news-of-easter
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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Free Sign Up Here
Resurrection as Injustice Undone
Now Available on Amazon!
Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political & Economic Teachings of the Gospels.
by Herb Montgomery
Available now on Amazon!
After two successful decades of preaching a gospel of love within the Christian faith tradition Herb felt like something was missing. He went back to the gospels and began reading them through the interpretive lenses of various marginalized communities and what he found radically changed his life forever. The teachings of the Jesus in the gospel stories express a profound concern for justice, compassion, and the well-being of those in marginalized communities. This book navigates the intersections between faith and societal justice, and presents a compelling argument for a more socially compassionate and just expression of Christianity. Herb’s findings in his latest book are shared in the hopes that it will dramatically impact how you practice your Christianity, too.
New Episode of JustTalking!
Season 2, Episode 7: Luke 24.36b-48. Lectionary B, Easter 3
Each week, we’ll be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it.
You can find the latest show on YouTube at
Season 2, Episode 7: Luke 24.36b-48. Lectionary B, Easter 3
Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment
Announcing a New Podcast from RHM!
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 1 Episode 1: Resurrection as Injustice Undone
Luke 24:36-48
“Whatever we make of the resurrection stories today, we cannot ignore the fact that nowhere in these passages is death lifted up. The good news is that injustice had been undone! Oppression and power don’t have to have the last words in our stories. The opposition doesn’t have to have the last word. Love can conquer injustice. Our stories aren’t over yet.”
Listen at:
https://the-social-jesus-podcast.simplecast.com/episodes/resurrection-as-injustice-undone
Resurrection as Injustice Undone
Herb Montgomery; April 12, 2024
Our gospel reading from the lectionary this third weekend of Easter is from the gospel of Luke:
While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.”
They were startled
and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.”
When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate it in their presence.
1` said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”
Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. (Luke 24:36-48)
Let’s get the context of this reading. It all begins back in the first verse of chapter 24.
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them,
“Why do you look for the living among the dead?
He is not here; he has risen!
Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee:
‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.”’ Then they remembered his words. (Luke 24:1-8)
Luke’s version of the resurrection story is probably my favorite of the four versions in our sacred canon. Unlike Mark and Matthew, which set up the early Jesus movement to grow out of a Galilean center, Luke sets the movement in a Judean center that begins in Jerusalem, not Galilee, and lays the foundation for the events we will read about in the book of Acts. What makes Luke my favorite, though, is that it captures best what the good news was for the early Lukan community: “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen!”
The good news for the early Jesus movement was not that Jesus had died. How could it have been? In the beginning, and for most of the early Jewish Jesus followers, the fact that Rome had again suppressed a Jewish movement for justice and change was not good news. The good news is that this Jesus, who stood with the marginalized and oppressed—this Jesus their God had brought back to life! The execution of Jesus had been reversed, undone, and defeated. Everything accomplished through the death of Jesus had been undone! Jesus salvific work had been interrupted but not stopped.
Now his life giving work would live on in the lives of his followers. They did not see their salvation as accomplished through the cross. They saw the cross as the status quo’s attempt to stop Jesus’ saving, life-giving work. And the resurrection was the sign that the cross had been reversed. Rome didn’t have the last word; justice, love, compassion had the last word. Now the saving work of Jesus would live on and grow.
Consider the emphasis in our reading: “The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day.” The point is not that Jesus would suffer and accomplish something through that suffering. No, it’s that though he would suffer, God would triumph over that suffering and bring him back to life. This is Easter’s good news. Hate, injustice, bigotry, power and privilege don’t have to have the last word in our stories. Justice and love can!
The book of Acts, which continues Luke, always defines Jesus’ resurrection as the good news, not his dying:
“With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God’s grace was so powerfully at work in them all.” (Acts 4:33, emphasis added)
The message was not one of death and dying, but of life and resurrection:
Fellow Israelites, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. This man was handed over to you by God’s deliberate plan and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. (Acts 2:22-24)
Their God had reversed Jesus’ death!
God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of it. Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. (Acts 2:32-33)
When Peter saw this, he said to them: “Fellow Israelites, why does this surprise you? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk? 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. You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this. By faith in the name of Jesus, this man whom you see and know was made strong. It is Jesus’ name and the faith that comes through him that has completely healed him, as you can all see. (Acts 3:12-16)
Historically, Christians have used these passages in antisemitic ways to harm our Jewish friends and neighbors. But Peter, who is speaking in Acts 2 and 3, is also a Jew, and the Jewish people did not crucify Jesus. In Luke’s gospel, the Jewish people loved Jesus. It was the elites who had everything to lose if their society took on the shape described in Jesus’ sermon on the mount or Luke’s sermon on the plain, and it was the elites who sought to use Rome’s strong arm to silence Jesus. This was not a religious conflict but a political one. It was not a matter of Christians versus Jews as antisemitic Christians have made it out to be. It was a conflict where the rich and powerful tried to stop Jesus (Luke 6:24) and God stepped in and undid their attempt.
Then know this, you and all the people of Israel: It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed. Jesus is ‘the stone you builders rejected, which has become the cornerstone.’ (Acts 4:10-11)
The God of our ancestors raised Jesus from the dead—whom you killed by hanging him from a tree. God exalted him to his own right hand as Prince and Savior that he might bring Israel to repentance and forgive their sins. We are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him.” (Acts 5:30-32)
You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, announcing the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all. You know what has happened throughout the province of Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached—how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.) We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They killed him by hanging him on a cross, but God raised him from the dead on the third day and caused him to be seen. He was not seen by all the people, but by witnesses whom God had already chosen—by us who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. (Acts 10:36-43)
So it is also stated elsewhere: ‘You will not let your holy one see decay.’ Now when David had served God’s purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his ancestors and his body decayed. But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay. Therefore, my friends, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. (Acts 13:35-38)
And lastly,
“We tell you the good news: What God promised our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. (Acts 13:32-33)
Whatever we make of the resurrection stories today, reading them through much more scientific lenses, we cannot ignore the fact that nowhere in the book of Acts is Jesus’ death lifted up. Nowhere does it suggest that or how Jesus’ death saves us. This is the canonical record of the gospel going forth to the world and nowhere is that gospel centered in Jesus dying. The gospel, without exception, is over and over again centered in how Jesus’ death had been reversed and overturned through him being brought back to life and what THAT now means to those who will follow Jesus’ teachings.
Now let’s get back to our reading for this week.
In Luke 24:9-13, Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and others tell the apostles what they’ve seen. The apostles don’t initially believe the women “because their words seemed to them like nonsense.” Then Peter gets up and runs to the tomb. (John’s gospel adds John to this part of the story, but in Luke’s version, John is not present.)
Then we come to the setup for our passage this week, the story of two followers of Jesus who were on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-32).
These two unknowingly run into Jesus as they travel, and through a series of interchanges share with him what’s been happening in Jerusalem and what the women have reported, which has left them scratching their heads. Jesus responds, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?”
These disciples still don’t recognize Jesus but implore Jesus to stay with them for the night.
“When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight.”
Verses 33-35 then read:
“They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, ‘It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.’ Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread.”
The good news is that Jesus’ death had been undone!
Whatever else we make of these stories today, their truth is that oppression and power don’t have to have the last words in our story. A world shaped by compassion, love and justice may meet opposition. Our efforts may even be stopped. But we can choose to keep going.
The opposition doesn’t have to have the last word. Love can conquer injustice. To borrow imagery used by the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we can choose to bend the moral arc of our universe toward justice even when it seems that those in power are choosing to bend it otherwise. Our stories aren’t over yet.
Discussion Group Questions
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your discussion group.
2. How does defining the crucifixion as the attempted interruption of Jesus’ saving work and the resurrection as injustice undone inform your own justice work today? 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.
I want to say a special thank you to all of our supporters out there. And if you would like to join them in supporting Renewed Heart Ministries’ work you can do so by going to renewedheartministries.com and clicking donate.
I want to also say a special thank you this week to Quoir Publishing, Keith Giles who wrote the foreword to my latest book, all the special people on our launch team, and all of you who made this release a success.
Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political and Economic Teachings of the Gospels is available now on Amazon in paperback, Kindle and soon also on Audible in audio book format.
As always, you can find Renewed Heart Ministries each week on X (or Twitter), Facebook, Instagram and Meta’s new Threads. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts. Also, if you enjoy listening to The Social Jesus podcast, please like and subscribe to the SJ podcast through the podcast platform you use and consider taking some time to give us a review. This helps others find our podcast as well.
You can watch our new YouTube show called “Just Talking” each week. Todd Leonard and I take a moment to talk about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it. You can find JustTalking each week on YouTube at youtube.com/@herbandtoddjusttalking. Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment.
And if you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week.
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The Good News Is About Life and Love, Not Death and Dying
Now Available on Amazon!
Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political & Economic Teachings of the Gospels.
by Herb Montgomery
Available now on Amazon!
After two successful decades of preaching a gospel of love within the Christian faith tradition Herb felt like something was missing. He went back to the gospels and began reading them through the interpretive lenses of various marginalized communities and what he found radically changed his life forever. The teachings of the Jesus in the gospel stories express a profound concern for justice, compassion, and the well-being of those in marginalized communities. This book navigates the intersections between faith and societal justice, and presents a compelling argument for a more socially compassionate and just expression of Christianity. Herb’s findings in his latest book are shared in the hopes that it will dramatically impact how you practice your Christianity, too.
New Episode of JustTalking!
Season 2, Episode 5: John 20.1-18 and Mark 16.1-8. Lectionary B, Easter 1
Each week, we’ll be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it.
You can find the latest show on YouTube at
https://youtu.be/Rpy-a_aB8TA?si=giEc-Sf7VH74n7Mv
Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment
The Good News Is About Life and Love, Not Death and Dying
Herb Montgomery, March 30, 2024
“Easter reminds us that our story isn’t about dying either. Our story is about how life can overcome death even when death is wielded as a weapon of injustice or used as an attempt to keep us down. The God of the resurrection story is on the side of the oppressed, marginalized, and downtrodden. And the power that can save our world is not one that appeals to more dying, but to a refusal to let go of life.”
To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here.
This week, our readings are from the gospels of John and Mark:
Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!”
So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. Then Simon Peter came along behind him and went straight into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus’ head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen. Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. (They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.) Then the disciples went back to where they were staying.
Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.
They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”
“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.
He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”
Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”
Jesus said to her, “Mary.”
She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means “Teacher”).
Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” And she told them that he had said these things to her. (John 20:1-18)
And Mark
When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body. Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb and they asked each other, “Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?”
But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away. As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed.
“Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’”
Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid. (Mark 16:1-8)
With these passages, the lectionary calls our attention to the earliest telling of the resurrection story in the gospels and the latest. What jumps out to me first is the evolution of women’s role in the stories. In Mark, women choose to be silent. But in John’s gospel, not only are women the first to announce the resurrection, but also, and in uncharacteristic fashion, the gospel names a specific woman (Mary) as the first among them to proclaim the good news of the resurrection.
Many scholars date the writing of the book of Mark as the same time as the pseudo-epistles of Paul. While the author of Timothy was telling women to be silent (cf. 1Timothy 2:12), Mark’s gospel is showing us what would have happened in relation to the resurrection if they had been. As patriarchal forces in the early church were gaining power and influence and women began to be marginalized in the Jesus movement (cf. 1 Corinthians 14:34), Mark’s gospel warns us of such non-egalitarian trends. The implication is, “Thank God women were not silent!” Because if they had been, we might never have heard the good news of the resurrection.
This leads me to what I believe was the original good news of the gospel for the early Jesus movement. The good news of the gospel was not that Jesus was crucified or had died for anyone, but that Jesus was alive! The cross had been reversed, overcome, and undone! And the news about that could not be contained!
Consider these passages that emphasize the preaching of the church in the books of Acts. Notice they aren’t merely preaching Jesus crucified. They are announcing Jesus has been resurrected!
With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. (Acts 4:33)
You crucified and killed by the hands of those outside the law. But God raised him up, having freed him from death, because it was impossible for him to be held in its power. (Acts 2:22-24)
This Jesus God raised up, and of that all of us are witnesses. (Acts 2:32-33)
You handed over and rejected in the presence of Pilate, though he had decided to release him. But you rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer given to you, and you killed the Author of life, but God raised from the dead. (Acts 3:12-16)
. . . Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, but whom God raised from the dead. (Acts 4:10-11)
The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree. (Acts 5:30-32)
They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day. (Acts 10:36-43)
Even though they found no cause for a sentence of death, they asked Pilate to have him killed. When they had carried out everything that was written about him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb. But God raised him from the dead . . . And we bring you the good news that what God promised to our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising Jesus. (Emphasis added) (Acts 13:35-38)
The good news for those in the book of Acts was not that Jesus had died, but that Jesus, whom the state had executed, had been brought back to life!
Whatever we make of these reports today, the lessons in these stories’ emphasis are not from Jesus’ dying but in the undoing of his death. The story is one about the ability of truth to overcome falsehood, of life to triumph over the death-dealing agents of our world, for love to conquer hate. Injustice doesn’t have to have the last word in our stories.
The good news, to use the words of Rev. Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas, was that the “crucifying powers of evil” have been defeated!
“The resurrection is God’s definitive victory over crucifying powers of evil . . . The impressive factor is how it [the cross] is defeated. It is defeated by a life-giving rather than a life-negating force. God’s power, unlike human power, is not a ‘master race’ kind of power. That is, it is not a power that diminishes the life of another so that others might live. God’s power respects the integrity of all human bodies and the sanctity of all life. This is a resurrecting power. Therefore, God’s power never expresses itself through the humiliation or denigration of another. It does not triumph over life. It conquers death by resurrecting life. The force of God is a death-negating, life-affirming force.” (Kelly Brown Douglas, Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God, pp. 182-183).
And a few pages later:
“What the resurrection points to, however, is not the meaning of Jesus’ death, but of his life.” (Ibid. p. 188)
The powers of the status quo had attempted to silence Jesus’ life-giving, “saving,” redemptive work. Yet through the narrative element of the resurrection, this attempt to end Jesus’ work is turned into a mere interruption. Whereas the cross was the state’s attempt to stop Jesus’ salvific work, the resurrection causes that work to continue despite the cross, and to especially continue in the lives of Jesus’ followers as we seek to be conduits of life, healing, and liberation our own contexts today.
Christianity isn’t a death cult. I agree with womanist matriarch Dr. Delores Williams, who has been relentless through the years in pulling back the curtain and showing us the intrinsic harm of faith traditions that find meaning in Jesus’ death on a cross: “Jesus came for life and to show us something about life and living together and what life was all about” (in Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas’ What’s Faith Got to Do With It?, p. 90)
Williams also wrote:
“Christians…cannot forget the cross, but neither can they glorify it. To do so is to glorify suffering and to render…exploitation sacred. To do so is to glorify the sin of defilement.” (Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God Talk, p.132)
So for me, the Jesus story isn’t about death. Easter reminds us that our story isn’t about dying either. Our story is about how life can overcome death even when death is wielded as a weapon of injustice or used as an attempt to keep us down. The God of the resurrection story is on the side of the oppressed, marginalized, and downtrodden. And the power that can save our world is not one that appeals to more dying, but to a refusal to let go of life.
Hate doesn’t have the last word. The Jesus story doesn’t end on Friday evening. And we can choose love and life as the last word for our stories too.
Discussion Group Questions
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your discussion group.
2. How does focusing on the resurrection rather than the crucifixion as the redeeming element in the Jesus story shape your own experience as a Jesus follower? 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.
I want to say a special thank you to all of our supporters out there. And if you would like to join them in supporting Renewed Heart Ministries’ work you can do so by going to renewedheartministries.com and clicking donate.
I want to also say a special thank you this week to Quoir Publishing, Keith Giles who wrote the foreword to my latest book, all the special people on our launch team, and all of you who made this release a success.
Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political and Economic Teachings of the Gospels is available now on Amazon in paperback, Kindle and soon also on Audible in audio book format.
As always, you can find Renewed Heart Ministries each week on X (or Twitter), Facebook, Instagram and Meta’s new Threads. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts. Also, if you enjoy listening to the Jesus for Everyone podcast, please like and subscribe to the JFE podcast through the podcast platform you use and consider taking some time to give us a review. This helps others find our podcast as well.
You can watch our new YouTube show called “Just Talking” each week. Todd Leonard and I take a moment to talk about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it. You can find JustTalking each week on YouTube at youtube.com/@herbandtoddjusttalking. Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment.
And if you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week.
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Resurrection as the Good News
This Week’s Episode of Just Talking Available on YouTube
New Episode of “Just Talking” Now Online!
Season 1, Episode 10: Luke 24:13-35. Lectionary A, Easter 3
Each week, we’ll be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it.
You can find the latest show on YouTube at https://youtu.be/9W7UpdIG2P4
Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment
Thanks in advance for watching!
Herb Montgomery | April 21, 2023
To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here.
If you find more life-giving value in the teachings of Jesus, teachings that the resurrection testifies to, I want to encourage you this week: you are not alone. Many who live in or stand in solidarity with oppressed communities have seen how destructive traditional explanations of Jesus’ death have been and can be.
Our reading this week is from the gospel of Luke:
Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem. They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; but they were kept from recognizing him.
He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?” They stood still, their faces downcast. One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?” “What things?” he asked. “About Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied. “He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place. In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had see`n a vision of angels, who said he was alive. Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see Jesus.”
He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.
As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus continued on as if he were going farther. But they urged him strongly, “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them.
When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?” They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, “It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.” Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread. (Luke 24:13-35*)
For the early Jesus followers, the good news was not that Jesus had died, or that Jesus had died for them, but that their Jesus, whom the Romans crucified, was alive! All that had been accomplished through the death of Jesus had been reversed, overcome, and undone. Jesus’ murder on the state’s cross had been intended to stop his life-saving work, but his resurrection transformed it into a mere interruption. The resurrection caused his saving work to live on, especially in the lives of his followers as they lived and shared what their Jesus taught.
I feel so strongly about this point. Much harm has been done in Christianity by focusing on Jesus’ death in other ways. I often refer to the essay For God So Loved the World? by Joanne Carlson Brown and Rebecca Parker, which explains some of the issues. As I’ve shared before, it is Jesus’ teachings that the early followers found to be intrinsically life-giving. That is the good news in the book of Acts: He whom “they” had killed, “God” had brought back to life.
“With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.” (Acts 4:33)
“You crucified and killed by the hands of those outside the law. But God raised him up, having freed him from death, because it was impossible for him to be held in its power.” (Acts 2:22-24)
“This Jesus God raised up, and of that all of us are witnesses.” (Acts 2:32-33)
“You handed over and rejected in the presence of Pilate, though he had decided to release him. But you rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer given to you, and you killed the Author of life, but God raised from the dead.” (Acts 3:12-16)
“. . . Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, but whom God raised from the dead. (Acts 4:10-11)
“The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree.” (Acts 5:30-32)
“They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day.” (Acts 10:36-43)
“Even though they found no cause for a sentence of death, they asked Pilate to have him killed. When they had carried out everything that was written about him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb. But God raised him from the dead . . . And we bring you the good news that what God promised to our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising Jesus.” (Acts 13:35-38)
If you find more life-giving value in the teachings of Jesus, teachings that the resurrection testifies to, I want to encourage you this week: you are not alone. Many who live in or stand in solidarity with oppressed communities have seen how destructive traditional explanations of Jesus’ death have been and can be (see What if Crucifixion Is Not Salvific? by Miguel A. De La Torre).
This week, in the spirit of those in our lectionary reading for whom the good news was that Jesus was alive, I want to share a small collection of encouraging quotations from other theologians who have deeply encouraged for me, and who have come to your same conclusion.
Kelly Brown Douglass gets us started:
“Jesus takes on evil. He takes on and defeats . . . not granting the power of death any authority over him . . . he does not respond in kind, by adopting the methods of this power. The final triumph over the death of the cross is the resurrection of Jesus . . . The resurrection is God’s definitive victory over the crucifying powers of evil . . . The cross represents the power that denigrates human bodies, destroys life, and preys on the most vulnerable in society. As the cross is defeated, so too is that power [defeated] by life-giving rather than a life-negating force . . . That is, it is not the power that diminishes the life of another so that others might live. God’s power respects the integrity of all human bodies and the sanctity of all life. This is a resurrecting power . . . God’s power never expresses itself through humiliation or denigration of another. It does not triumph over life. It conquers death by resurrecting life . . . If indeed the power of life that God stands for is greater than the power of death, this must be manifest in the way God triumphs over death-dealing powers. The freedom of God that is life requires a liberation from the very weapons utilized by a culture of death. In other words, these weapons cannot become divine weapons . . . The culmination of this liberation is Jesus’ resurrection.” (Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God, p. 181-182)
Next is from Delores Williams:
“It seems more intelligent and more scriptural to understand that redemption had to do with God, through Jesus, giving humankind new vision to see the resources for positive, abundant relational life. Redemption had to do with God, through the ministerial vision, giving humankind the ethical thought and practice upon which to build positive, productive quality of life. Hence, the kingdom of God theme in the ministerial vision of Jesus does not point to death; it is not something one has to die to reach. Rather, the kingdom of God is a metaphor of hope God gives those attempting to right the relations between self and self, between self and others, between self and God as prescribed in the sermon on the mount, in the golden rule and in the commandment to show love above all else. (Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk, pp. 130-131)
Lastly is a passage from Joanne Carlson Brown and Rebecca Parker:
“Suffering is never redemptive, and suffering cannot be redeemed. The cross is a sign of tragedy. God’s grief is revealed there and everywhere and every time life is thwarted by violence. God’s grief is as ultimate as God’s love. Every tragedy eternally remains and is eternally mourned. Eternally the murdered scream, Betrayal. Eternally God sings kaddish for the world. To be a Christian means keeping faith with those who have heard and lived God’s call for justice, radical love, and liberation; who have challenged unjust systems both political and ecclesiastical; and who in that struggle have refused to be victims and have refused to cower under the threat of violence, suffering, and death. Fullness of life is attained in moments of decision for such faithfulness and integrity. When the threat of death is refused and the choice is made for justice, radical love, and liberation, the power of death is overthrown. Resurrection is radical courage. Resurrection means that death is overcome in those precise instances when human beings choose life, refusing the threat of death. Jesus climbed out of the grave in the Garden of Gethsemane when he refused to abandon his commitment to the truth even though his enemies threatened him with death. On Good Friday, the Resurrected One was Crucified” (In For God So Loved the World?)
Maybe there are so many atonement theories that fail to adequately explain how Jesus death saves because it doesn’t save. Maybe our questions as to how Jesus’ death saves go unanswered because we are asking the wrong question. I, like the scholars mentioned above, find much more life in focusing on the intrinsic, saving value of the teachings of Jesus. For me, this intrinsic salvific value is life-giving good news.
The resurrection story elements in the gospels tell me that violence, bigotry, misogyny, patriarchy, racism, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, classism, authoritarianism, environmental destruction, and a host of other injustices in our world today don’t have to have the last word. They may interrupt our work of shaping our world into a safe, compassionate, just home for all, but if we keep at it, they will just be interruptions. Love can transform hate. Elements of our communities and societies that are death-dealing can be undone by our choosing things that are life-giving. Death and injustice don’t have to have the last word.
For me, in the wake of Easter, this is much needed good news.
HeartGroup Application
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your HeartGroup.
2. How is the resurrection good news for you? Share 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.
You can find Renewed Heart Ministries on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts. Also, if you enjoy listening to the Jesus for Everyone podcast, please like and subscribe to the JFE podcast through the podcast platform you use and consider taking some time to give us a review. This helps others find our podcast as well.
Also I want to share that we are partnering in a new weekly YouTube show called “Just Talking.” Each week, Todd Leonard and I will be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it. You can find JustTalking each week on YouTube at youtube.com/@herbandtoddjusttalking. Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment.
And if you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.
My new book, Finding Jesus: A story of a fundamentalist preacher who unexpectedly discovered the social, political, and economic teachings of the Gospels is now also available at renewedheartministries.com
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week.
*Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
Now Available at Renewed Heart Ministries!
Herb’s new book Finding Jesus: A story of a fundamentalist preacher who unexpectedly discovered the social, political, and economic teachings of the Gospels, is available at renewedheartministries.com.
Get your copy today at renewedheartministries.com
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To Loose or Bind, To Forgive or not Forgive
This Week’s Episode of Just Talking Available on YouTube
New Episode of “Just Talking” Now Online!
Season 1, Episode 9: John 20:19-31. Lectionary A, Easter 2.
Each week, we’ll be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it.
You can find the latest show on YouTube at https://youtu.be/MPmQ-4vgtpQ
Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment
Thanks in advance for watching!
Herb Montgomery | April 14, 2023
To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here.
“Forgiveness can be life-giving or death-dealing. Not forgiving, can be death-dealing or life-giving, too. I’m thinking of restorative justice practices where not forgiving a wrong, but the practice of having restitution made is more life-giving. Loosing can be life-giving or death-dealing. Lastly, binding can be life-giving or death-dealing. It is the job of each of us to practice informed wisdom that finds the most life-giving practice for the situations we find ourselves in.”
Our reading this week is from the book of John.
On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.
Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”
Now Thomas (also known as Didymus ), one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!”
But he said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”
A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.”
Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!”
Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. (John 20:19-31)
The first thing to consider as we read this week’s passage is that this is a commission story about the disciples. Mark’s gospel originally had no story where the disciples were commissioned: the last half of Mark 16 is a much later addition.
Matthew’s commission story is found in Matthew 28:18-20:
Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go [beginning in Galilee] and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Luke’s and Acts’ commission stories can be found in Luke 24:47-48 and Acts 1:8.
“And repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.”
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Each of these commission stories are separate. They are not three different versions of the same story with minor differences; they are three completely different stories in different settings, each told for the distinct purposes of the communities they were written for.
Our reading this week is a disciple-commissioning story that was told in the Johannine community before John 21, a redundant and later addition written by other authors.
Another thing to name about John’s narratives is that, once again, the gospel takes an anti-Jewish approach. In our story this week, the disciples are in hiding in fear of the Jewish leaders. In our current political anti-Semitic climate, our first priority as Jesus followers should be to do no harm to our Jewish friends and neighbors. In the other gospels, Mark, Matthew and Luke, the tension between the narrative and Jesus’ Jewish society is much more a matter of class than ethnicity. It is, to begin with, an in-house debate within Judaism, between Jews.
But by the time of the much-later-written gospel of John, conflicts are characterized much more as the early Christian community versus “the Jews.” This characterization of Jewish people in John’s gospel has repeatedly inspired Christians to harm the Jewish community throughout history, including during the Holocaust.
Every time our sacred writings speak in ways that have harmed people or communities, it is important that we name, repent of, and seek to repair that harm. This responsibility definitely applies to Christians and our Jewish neighbors. Many Christians still mislabel and mischaracterize Jewish people today. Yet the reality is that our Jesus was Jewish and raised in the Jewish wisdom tradition. We, as Jesus followers, could learn a lot from that Jewish wisdom. We don’t have to demonize Jewish people or Jewish wisdom to lift up Jesus today. Jewish people are not our enemy.
In our story this week, Jesus “breathes” the Spirit on the disciples. This description may be seem odd to us today, but it would have been meaningful in the Johannine community, and it became especially meaningful for later Christian Gnostic communities.
Out of Jesus’ breathing of the spirit, the disciples gain the ability to “loose” or “bind,” the ability to forgive or not forgive.
Matthew describes this ability being commissioned to the disciples with some similar language:
“I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” (Matthew 16:19)
“Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” (Matthew 18;18)
We can read the version in John’s gospel prescriptive or descriptively.
A prescriptive read means that Jesus is giving the prerogative to forgive some things and not forgive other things to the church. Historically, especially in the Western Christian tradition, this reading has placed too much power in the hands of religious authorities. To put fallible humans in a position where they can claim to administer or withhold divine forgiveness within a religious community has come with mixed results. Some have found nourishment in the idea that the Church actually does have spiritual authority and can speak into the material world and among Christians for justice in a way that helps re-order this world in meaningful and practical ways. The Church’s binding and loosing capacity is nourishing to them. And this has been abused, too, resulting in some problematic and destructive consequences. Marginalized communities have both been harmed and helped within church history here, and so we must tread carefully. Religious people, of all faiths, have a clear moral responsibility and role to play in shaping our world into a safe home for all. Forgiveness can be life-giving or death-dealing. Not forgiving, can be death-dealing or life-giving, too. I’m thinking of restorative justice practices where not forgiving a wrong, but the practice of having restitution made is more life-giving. Loosing can be life-giving or death-dealing. Lastly, binding can be life-giving or death-dealing. It is the job of each of us to practice informed wisdom that finds the most life-giving practice for the situations we find ourselves in.
Looking at this phrase descriptively should also give us pause. If Jesus is just describing what these disciples who will tell the initial Jesus story will mean for others, and why it is so important for them to get that story right, then this passage makes more sense for me but doesn’t feel much better. There are Christians today who are still binding and loosing, forgiving and not forgiving. Sometimes they represent a God of love in life-giving ways, and at other times they represent God in very death-dealing ways.
As just one example, many Christians still harmfully interpret the handful of passages in the Bible that have been used against LGBTQ people. Countless LGBTQ young people have been raised in Christian homes, taught to be ashamed and scared of what they’re encouraged to believe is “wrong” with them. They come to believe they are sinful, broken, or have an orientation that is a by-product of sin rather than an example of the beautiful diversity and variation of humanity. Christians have bound these youth with feelings of inferiority and the fear of rejection if they share their truth with their families. Parents, too, are still encouraged and even commanded to reject their children simply because of whom they are attracted to or love.
Whether I like it or not, whether I am comfortable with it or not, the power to loose or bind, to make someone feel forgiven or not forgiven, accepted or rejected, included or marginalized, is intrinsically in the hands of every Jesus follower. How we take on the name of Jesus and how we represent Jesus and relate to the people around us matters. It matters whether we are Jesus followers or not, but it matters even more when we are. This should give us pause and inspire us to use gentle care when relating to everyone. We will make mistakes, for sure, but when we do err, we should be erring on the side of compassion.
This week’s reading is also a good reminder that all theology has political, economic, and social functions. As we assess any particular theology, it’s helpful to understand the political, economic and social implications that rise from it and to also know that all theologies come with underlying biases and motives at work. Some motives are more obvious, and others less so. Regardless, all theologies are political, with economic implications and social outcomes.
The last part of our reading this week is about Thomas. The scholarly evidence points to this story being a late tradition to the text. Thomas’ reference to Jesus as God is also unique in the four canonical gospels. No other disciple refers to Jesus as “God” in any of the gospel narratives. This story therefore serves to establish the authority of Thomas for the Christian communities that grew up around his apostleship. That authority would have been important for later Gnostic Christians and others reading the gospel of Thomas.
This week, let’s take this week’s passage as our guide and choose to relate to others in ways that are liberating, not oppressive, loosing and binding. Let’s follow Jesus in whatever way is life-giving for the given moment and situation. And remember, that when we claim to follow Jesus, for better or for worse, we will be viewed as representing that Jesus and we can in those moments hold in our hands life or death. Let’s be sources of healing, and life, and justice and inclusion.
HeartGroup Application
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your HeartGroup.
2. In what ways have you experienced the above authority in our reading practiced in life-giving ways? In what ways has it been destructive? Share 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.
You can find Renewed Heart Ministries on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts. Also, if you enjoy listening to the Jesus for Everyone podcast, please like and subscribe to the JFE podcast through the podcast platform you use and consider taking some time to give us a review. This helps others find our podcast as well.
Also I want to share that we are partnering in a new weekly YouTube show called “Just Talking.” Each week, Todd Leonard and I will be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it. You can find JustTalking each week on YouTube at youtube.com/@herbandtoddjusttalking. Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment.
And if you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.
My new book, Finding Jesus: A story of a fundamentalist preacher who unexpectedly discovered the social, political, and economic teachings of the Gospels is now also available at renewedheartministries.com
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week.
* Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
Now Available at Renewed Heart Ministries!
Herb’s new book Finding Jesus: A story of a fundamentalist preacher who unexpectedly discovered the social, political, and economic teachings of the Gospels, is available at renewedheartministries.com.
Get your copy today at renewedheartministries.com
Are you receiving all of RHM’s free resources each week?
Begin each day being inspired toward love, compassion, action, and justice. Free Sign-Up HERE
Resurrection and Listening to Those on the Margins
New Episode of Just Talking Available on YouTube
New Episode of “Just Talking” Now Online!
Season 1, Episode 8: John 20.1-18. Lectionary A, Resurrection of the Lord
Each week, we’ll be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it.
You can find the latest show on YouTube at https://youtu.be/a0iHvj6_PYM
Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment
Thanks in advance for watching!
Herb Montgomery | April 7, 2023
To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here.
Change begins from the margins of our society inward, from the grassroots up. And in our reading this week, change begins in an empty tomb after a Roman cross, with a woman named Mary daring to hope again, and a Jesus mistaken for a gardener, planting in the hearts of his early followers the seeds of his vision for a world that is a safe, compassionate and just home for everyone.
Our reading this week is from the gospel of John:
Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples returned to their homes.
But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet.They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.”
Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her. (John 20:1-18*)
This weekend for many Western Christians is Easter, a celebration memorializing the resurrection.
Before we jump into this week’s reading from John, I want to remind us that for many early Christians, the good news was not that Jesus had died—especially not that he had died for them or to pay for their sins—but that Jesus, whom the Romans crucified, God had brought back to life. The good news was that Jesus was alive, and all that was accomplished through Jesus death was reversed, undone, and overcome in the resurrection.
I’ll cite the book of Acts here. Nowhere does the book of Acts define the good news of the gospel as Jesus dying. Rather, the good news in the book of Acts is that the crucified Jesus has been brought back to life. He is alive!
“With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.” (Acts 4:33)
“You crucified and killed by the hands of those outside the law. But God raised him up, having freed him from death, because it was impossible for him to be held in its power.” (Acts 2:22-24)
“This Jesus God raised up, and of that all of us are witnesses.” (Acts 2:32-33)
“You handed over and rejected in the presence of Pilate, though he had decided to release him. But you rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer given to you, and you killed the Author of life, but God raised from the dead.” (Acts 3:12-16)
“. . . Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, but whom God raised from the dead. (Acts 4:10-11)
“The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree.” (Acts 5:30-32)
“They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day.” (Acts 10:36-43)
“Even though they found no cause for a sentence of death, they asked Pilate to have him killed. When they had carried out everything that was written about him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb. But God raised him from the dead . . . And we bring you the good news that what God promised to our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising Jesus.” (Acts 13:35-38)
I resonate deeply with Delores S. Williams on this point. Speaking in the context of how Black women have experienced harm in their Christian communities through certain interpretations of Jesus’ death on the cross, Williams writes, “As Christians, Black women cannot forget the cross, but neither can they glorify it.” (in Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk, p. 132)
Williams reminds us that Jesus didn’t come to die. He came to show us how to live.
“Matthew, Mark and Luke suggest that Jesus did not come to redeem humans by showing them God’s ‘love’ manifested in the death of God’s innocent child on a cross erected by cruel, imperialistic, patriarchal power. Rather, the texts suggest that the spirit of God in Jesus came to show humans life . . . The response to this invitation by human principalities and powers was the horrible deed the cross represents—the evil of humankind trying to kill the ministerial vision of life in relation that Jesus brought to humanity. The resurrection does not depend upon the cross for life, for the cross only represents historical evil trying to defeat good.” (In Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk, p. 130)
Williams continues:
“It seems more intelligent and more scriptural to understand that redemption had to do with God, through Jesus, giving humankind new vision to see the resources for positive, abundant relational life. Redemption had to do with God, through the ministerial vision, giving humankind the ethical thought and practice upon which to build positive, productive quality of life. Hence, the kingdom of God theme in the ministerial vision of Jesus does not point to death; it is not something one has to die to reach. Rather, the kingdom of God is a metaphor of hope God gives those attempting to right the relations between self and self, between self and others, between self and God as prescribed in the sermon on the mount, in the golden rule and in the commandment to show love above all else. (Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk, pp. 130-131)
Again the witness from the book of Acts:
“We bring you the good news that what God promised to our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising Jesus.” (Acts 13:32-33)
John, the book this week’s reading is from, was written when the Jesus movement, heavily influenced by the surrounding culture and social structures of certain communities, had been taken over by patriarchists. The early egalitarianism of the house churches was being pushed out by those who favored the more patriarchal structures of the surrounding civic organizations (see In Memory of Her: A Feminist Reconstruction of Christian Origins by Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza). Interpretations and arguments that did not previously exist in the Jesus movement begin being seen in the early church. One famous example is the statement in 1 Timothy 2:11-14:
“A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.”
This was a time when communities that recognized the apostleship of Peter and other male disciples began to be in conflict with communities that recognized the apostleship of Mary Magdalene and other women like Priscilla in the early church. The era of the patristic fathers was about to begin.
So it is interesting that in this same era, the gospel of John gives us this week’s story. Jesus could have showed up to either of the two male disciples referenced in the story, but instead he chooses to appear first to Mary. As has been often said, when she tells the other believers what she has heard and experienced, Mary becomes an apostle to the apostles. Patriarchists taught that woman, symbolized by Eve, was the first human to be deceived, but in John’s gospel, woman is the first human to believe in the risen Jesus. Mary is the new Eve.
This makes sense in terms of our journey so far through the gospel of John in the lectionary. The Johannine community had many Gnostic leanings. In later Gnostic communities, a person’s sex was a material matter, not spiritual. It was part of the concrete realm of their physical bodies. What mattered to these dualistic, binary communities was a person’s soul or spirit, regardless of whether their spirits lived in a physical body that was male or female. So these communities were much more egalitarian in practice than more orthodox, patriarchal Christian communities.
Though I reject the Gnostics’ belittling of our bodies and the concrete world, especially considering our dire need to reverse climate change and the very real, material injustices that some communities fight to survive and thrive in spite of every day, I appreciate the egalitarian practices that these early beliefs led to. I reject the Gnostic basis for those practices (i.e. the belief that the material world doesn’t matter), yet we, as contemporary Jesus followers, can still learn from some of those practices given the injustices women still face in our society today.
This week’s reading shows me a Jesus who choose to reveal himself first to Mary. Not to Peter, nor to John. It reminds me of the importance, especially in our current social context, of listening to women when they speak their truth. This Easter, let’s focus on the life-giving good news of love, justice, and their power to overcome, reverse, and undo the death-dealing things in our world. Let’s begin, like Jesus, with prioritizing the voices of women sharing the truth. Then, let’s not stop there! Let’s prioritize all the voices that our systems and practices push to the margins and undersides of our society.
Change begins from the margins of our society inward, from the grassroots up. And in our reading this week, change begins in an empty tomb after a Roman cross, with a woman named Mary daring to hope again, and a Jesus mistaken for a gardener, planting in the hearts of his early followers the seeds of his vision for a world that is a safe, compassionate and just home for everyone.
What is this story of Mary and Jesus saying to you this week?
HeartGroup Application
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your HeartGroup.
2. Again, what is this story of Mary and Jesus saying to you this week? Share 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.
You can find Renewed Heart Ministries on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. If you haven’t done so already, please follow us on your chosen social media platforms for our daily posts. Also, if you enjoy listening to the Jesus for Everyone podcast, please like and subscribe to the JFE podcast through the podcast platform you use and consider taking some time to give us a review. This helps others find our podcast as well.
Also I want to share that we are partnering in a new weekly YouTube show called “Just Talking.” Each week, Todd Leonard and I will be talking about the gospel lectionary reading for the upcoming weekend. We’ll be talking about each reading in the context of love, inclusion, and societal justice. Our hope is that our talking will be just talking (as in justice) and that during our brief conversations each week you’ll be inspired to also 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, you might like it. You can find JustTalking each week on YouTube at youtube.com/@herbandtoddjusttalking. Please Like, Subscribe, hit the Notification button, and leave us a comment.
And if you’d like to reach us here at Renewed Heart Ministries through email, you can reach us at info@renewedheartministries.com.
My new book, Finding Jesus: A story of a fundamentalist preacher who unexpectedly discovered the social, political, and economic teachings of the Gospels is now also available at renewedheartministries.com
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week.
* Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
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Another Beginning
Herb Montgomery | April 29, 2022
To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here.
“This third weekend after Easter in our western Christian calendar, how is the Jesus of this story calling you to renew how you follow him. In our world deeply in need of love, compassion, justice, and action, what does following Jesus in your context look like? This is a good time of year to reconsider all of these questions.”
Our reading this week is from the gospel of John:
Afterward Jesus appeared again to his disciples, by the Sea of Galilee. It happened this way: Simon Peter, Thomas (also known as Didymus), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. “I’m going out to fish,” Simon Peter told them, and they said, “We’ll go with you.” So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.
Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus. He called out to them, “Friends, haven’t you any fish?” “No,” they answered. He said, “Throw your net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.” When they did, they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish.
Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Messiah!” As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, “It is the Messiah,” he wrapped his outer garment around him (for he had taken it off) and jumped into the water. The other disciples followed in the boat, towing the net full of fish, for they were not far from shore, about a hundred yards. When they landed, they saw a fire of burning coals there with fish on it, and some bread. Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish you have just caught.” So Simon Peter climbed back into the boat and dragged the net ashore.
It was full of large fish, 153, but even with so many the net was not torn. Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” None of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord. Jesus came, took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish.
This was now the third time Jesus appeared to his disciples after he was raised from the dead.
When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” “Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.” Again Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.” The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my sheep.
“Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, “Follow me!” (John 21:1-19)
This week’s story begins with the disciples who were fishermen returning to their occupation after Jesus’ crucifixion, back to where Jesus initially found them. John 21 functions as an appendix to John’s gospel. Most scholars understand this version of the Jesus story to have ended in chapter 20, while they understand Chapter 21 to have been written by a different author. Chapter 21 also adds another post-resurrection appearance of Jesus, and carefully re-establishes Peter’s authority in the early Jesus movement since the other gospel versions paint Peter as denying Jesus during Jesus’ arrest.
The passage states that this is Jesus’ third post resurrection appearance in John. The author has counted wrong or is purposely leaving out one of Jesus’ appearances earlier in John’s gospel. As I shared a couple weeks ago, in these post-resurrection appearances in John’s gospel, three of the early Jesus communities are competing for authority: the community that recognized the leadership of Mary, the community that recognized the authority of Peter (highlighted this week), and the Johannine community in which the rest of the gospel of John was written.
Again, this chapter has more in common with the synoptic gospels than it does with the rest of John. I wrote at length about the imagery of fishing in the synoptic gospels last February in Decolonizing Fishing for People. I want to reference again how the Hebrew prophetic justice tradition interprets fishing, as a metaphor for removing unjust political rulers from power. It is not like the Christian colonialist metaphor of evangelism.
“There is perhaps no expression more traditionally misunderstood than Jesus’ invitation to these workers to become ‘fishers of men.’ This metaphor, despite the grand old tradition of missionary interpretation, does not refer to the ‘saving of souls,’ as if Jesus were conferring on these men instant evangelist status. Rather the image is carefully chosen from Jeremiah 16:16, where it is used as a symbol of Yahweh’s censure of Israel. Elsewhere the ‘hooking of fish’ is a euphemism for judgment upon the rich (Amos 4:2) and powerful (Ezekiel 29:4). Taking this mandate for his own, Jesus is inviting common folk to join him in the struggle to overturn the existing order of power and privilege.” (Ched Myers, Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark’s Story of Jesus, p. 132)
Speaking of those who do harm within their positions of power, Jeremiah reads:
“But now I will send for many fishermen,” declares the LORD, “and they will catch them. After that I will send for many hunters, and they will hunt them down on every mountain and hill and from the crevices of the rocks.” (Jeremiah 16:16)
Speaking of those who “oppress the poor and crush the needy,” Amos reads:
The Sovereign LORD has sworn by his holiness: “The time will surely come when you will be taken away with hooks, the last of you with fishhooks.” (Amos 4:2)
Speaking of the abusive Pharaoh, king of Egypt, Ezekiel reads:
In the tenth year, in the tenth month on the twelfth day, the word of the LORD came to me: “Son of man, set your face against Pharaoh king of Egypt and prophesy against him and against all Egypt. Speak to him and say, ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says:
“I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt,
you great monster lying among your streams.
You say, ‘The Nile belongs to me;
I made it for myself.’
“But I will put hooks in your jaws
and make the fish of your streams stick to your scales.
I will pull you out from among your streams,
with all the fish sticking to your scales.
I will leave you in the desert,
you and all the fish of your streams.
You will fall on the open field
and not be gathered or picked up.
I will give you as food
to the beasts of the earth and the birds of the sky.
Then all who live in Egypt will know that I am the LORD.” (Ezekiel 29:1-6)
In this last chapter, John imbues this imagery with fresh direction and purpose for the post-resurrection Jesus followers. (Read more in “Decolonizing fishing for people.”)
As noted, we also see the authors taking great pains to reestablish Peter’s authority as a trustworthy shepherd in the early Jesus movement through three confessions that parallel his three, previous denials (John 18:15-27). The end of this appendix, written after Peter’s death, has Jesus foreshadowing the manner of Peter’s death.
Later in this chapter, outside of our reading this week, we see the tension between the communities that recognized the leadership of John and the communities that recognized the authority of Peter (cf. verses 20-23). The early movement recognizes both John and Peter, and makes room for both communities to co-exist side by side.
Jesus ends this scene by renewing his original call to Peter when he found him fishing in the beginning. We have now come full circle, and Jesus once again calls Peter saying, “Follow me.”
This third weekend after Easter in our western Christian calendar, how is the Jesus of this story calling you to renew how you follow him. In our world deeply in need of love, compassion, justice, and action, what does following Jesus in your context look like? This is a good time of year to reconsider all of these questions: the resurrection marks the beginning of a new year in the Christian calendar. How will your Jesus-following help you participate in shaping our world into a safe, compassionate just home for everyone this next cycle?
May each of us who endeavor to follow Jesus’ moral philosophy and teachings in the coming year do so in life-giving ways. May our presence in each of the communities we live in bless those around us. This spring, may tulips and daffodils not be the only ones waking up from winter, but may the rays of the sun also usher us toward choices that lead to more just world.
HeartGroup Application
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your HeartGroup.
2. How will your Jesus-following help you participate in shaping our world into a safe, compassionate just home for everyone this next cycle? 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.
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week
Begin each day being inspired toward love, compassion, action, and justice.
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Breathing In Spirit, Exhaling Love and Justice
Herb Montgomery | April 22, 2022
To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here.
“In the stories, Jesus doesn’t come back from the dead just to live another 30 or so years doing the same thing he’d done before he was executed. The attempted silencing of Jesus and his saving work is only an interruption, not an end. Each resurrection story defines Jesus’ resurrection as causing his life work to continue in the lives of his followers. Jesus commissioned his disciples to continue his life work in the same spirit that inspired him.”
Our reading this week is from the gospel of John:
On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Messiah. Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”
Now Thomas (also known as Didymus), one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Messiah!” But he said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”
A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” Thomas said to him, “My Savior and my God!” Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. (John 20:19-31)
This first weekend after Western Christianity’s Easter each year, we begin reading the stories of the early believers after the resurrection. In each post resurrection story, the good news or gospel is not that Jesus died or even died for you, but that this Jesus that was brutally murdered by the state and those who controlled the status quo is risen. He’s alive! The crucifixion and all that Jesus’ death accomplished has been undone, reversed, and overcome!
This week’s story from John is similar to yet still very different from those found in Luke 24:36-49, Mark 16:14-18, Matthew 28:18-20, and Acts 1:8.
In John, Jesus cryptically breathes the Holy Spirit onto his disciples. He then attaches to this gift of the spirit the authority of “loosing and binding,” forgiving, bringing comfort and liberation, and setting people free (cf. Matthew 16:19; Matthew 18:18).
It’s vital that the power of forgiving or not forgiving is connected to the disciples receiving the spirit of Jesus. Forgiveness divorced from that spirit serves to only perpetuate oppression and harm. I’ll explain.
Jesus uses this language in the gospel of Luke:
“The Spirit of the Most High is on me,
because the Most High has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
The Most High has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
to proclaim the year of the Most High’s favor.” (Luke 4:18-19)
Here the work of the Spirit is to announce good news to the poor, proclaim freedom for prisoners, set the oppressed free, and announce the year of the Most High’s favor, the year when all debts would be forgiven, regardless of creditors’ wishes. In that year, debtors were released!
Those who are forgiven in the Jesus story are those on the margins, those pushed to the underside and edges of Jesus’ society by those benefiting from the status quo. What about those whose social location was more at the center or upper class? Did Jesus extend forgiveness to them, too?
Remember the story of Zacchaeus? (see Luke 19:1-9) Jesus forgave and loosed him, too. Yet Zacchaeus was not loosed or forgiven from the consequences from his actions. Jesus instead called him to stop participating in oppression. Only then did salvation come to Zacchaeus’ house, because salvation looks like justice for the oppressed. This reminds me of Gandhi critiquing Christianity: he said he didn’t want to be saved from the consequences of his actions but from those actions themselves.
How many times have we seen those who harm others or benefit from that harm being forgiven or assured of no condemnation without being called to make restitution or reparations?
Being loosed is not conditional on acts of restoration like a quid pro quo, tit for tat, or an exchange. Rather, for oppressors, being loosed actually is these acts of restoring that which has been taken from others.
This is why I believe the disciples were given authority not to forgive, too. Reserving “forgiveness” is a way to remind them that their freedom is intrinsically tied to their choice to stop participating in the harm being done to others. Anything less than that is what Dietrich Bonhoeffer described as “cheap grace.” During the 1930s, Bonhoeffer watched Christians giving assurance to the Nazis. Assuring oppressors that everything is okay while they continuing to do harm is akin to expecting victims or survivors to reconcile with those who have harmed them but done no work of restitution. Neither of these are life-giving interpretations of the forgiveness ethic in the Jesus stories.
These stories don’t help us recover so much of the historical Jesus as much as they establish the authority of his disciples. In this week’s reading, the focus is Thomas and the story about him serves a double purpose for the fledgling Jesus movement.
First, it establishes Thomas as an early movement leader. Multiple documents in Christian history would later be attributed to this disciple. Thomas is supposed to have taken the gospel to the Parthians and then on to India. He is credited with establishing the Mar Thoma Church and was martyred there as well. Thomas is also a central figure in Syrian Christianity: his bones are claimed by that faith tradition to have been removed from India and brought to Edessa close to the end of the fourth century.
Second, this story challenges people to believe in the Jesus story even though they haven’t seen Jesus for themselves.
What speaks to me most about these stories is that Jesus didn’t come back from the dead just to live another 30 or so years doing the same thing he’d done before he was executed. The attempted silencing of Jesus and his saving work is only an interruption, not an end. Each resurrection story defines Jesus’ resurrection as causing his life work to continue in the lives of his followers. Jesus commissioned his disciples to continue his life work in the same spirit that inspired him.
I consider again how Jesus’ life work was summarized in passages like Luke 4:18-19: as good news for the poor, release for the prisoners, setting free the oppressed, and proclaiming the most High’s favor or forgiving debts. There are similar teachings in both Luke’s sermon on the plain (Luke 6) and Matthew’s sermon on the mount (beginning in Matthew 5). These are the ethics and values in the Jesus story: Jesus both comforted and challenged individuals and also, in his overturning of the tables, challenged unjust systems, demanding a different order of things in the here and now.
So I ask myself, am I breathing in this same spirit that we read of in this week’s passage? And how closely is my story aligning with the Jesus story?
In what areas does my life harmonize with the Jesus story? Where is there dissonance?
Each of us looses and binds things every day. Are the things I bind and loose similar to or vastly different from the liberation work, the love, compassion, safety and justice in the Jesus story?
This first weekend after Easter, I want to foster more harmony between my life story and this story of Jesus that I hold dear.
I’m sure you do, too.
Here’s to breathing in that spirit, together, and exhaling love and justice with those our lives touch each and every day.
HeartGroup Application
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your HeartGroup.
2. In what ways are you inspired to breath in spirit and exhale love and justice in your own spheres of influence this new year? 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.
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week
Easter and the Myth of Redemptive Suffering
Herb Montgomery | April 15, 2021
To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here.
“These are valid questions. How can we reconcile seeing the cross event as a salvific divine act without unintentionally inferring that God’s power to save is rooted in willingness to humiliate, physically denigrate, and violate someone’ body to save others?”
Our reading this week is from the gospel of John:
Now it was the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene came, early on while it was still dark, to the tomb and saw the stone removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Messiah out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” Then Peter and the other disciple came and went to the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple ran ahead of Peter and reached the tomb first. And bending down to see, saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not enter. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb, and he saw the linen wrapping lying there. And the facecloth that had been on Jesus’s head, not lying with the linens wrappings but rolled up separately in another place. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, went in and saw and believed. Indeed they did not understand the scripture that it was necessary for Jesus to rise from the dead. Then the disciples returned once more to their homes.
Now Mary stood outside, facing the tomb, weeping. As she wept, she bent down to see in the tomb. Then she saw two angels in white sitting, one at thread and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been lying. They said to her, “Woman, why do you weep?” She said to them, “Because they have taken my Savior, and I do not know where they have laid him.” Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why do you weep? For whom do you look?” Thinking that he was the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (Which means Teacher.) Jesus said to her, “Do not hold me, because I have not yet ascend to the Father. Rather go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I and ascending to my Abba and you Abba, to my God and your God.” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Savior”; and she told them that he had said these things to her. (John 20:1-18, translation by Rev. Dr. Wilda Gafney; A Women’s Lectionary for the Whole Church: Year W)
This week, we are reading the resurrection narrative found in the gospel of John. This is a combined resurrection narrative developed after the early Jesus movement, and I believe there is something we can glean from this version.
One thing that is common to all the gospel narratives is the presence of women at the tomb of Jesus. In John’s version, notice that Mary uses the word “we.” Women who had the courage to go to the tomb as soon as there was daylight after the Sabbath led to the first proclamation of the resurrection. Those who showed up first got to be the first ones to share the good news. John’s version of this story encourages me to speak out when men and institutions say women can’t posses equal authority or credentials to proclaim the gospel.
Each resurrection narrative also begins in sorrow, and as John tells the story, I can imagine Jesus saying Mary’s name tenderly. I love that she mistook Jesus for a gardener: the detail grounds this version of the story in the interconnectedness with our natural world that gardeners know firsthand. I also love how Mary had to be told to let go. Wouldn’t you have held on as she did if you had just witnessed the brutal murder of someone you cared so deeply for, and now saw him alive again, standing right in front of you?
This version of the story also tells us something about how diverse the early Jesus followers were. Some patriarchal groups eventually won the power struggle and they came to shape the Christian religion. But early on, there were more egalitarian communities of Jesus followers, some who valued Mary Magdalene as others would later value the Apostle John, the Apostle Peter, and the Apostle Paul.
John’s gospel represents the community that valued John, yet even here we can see signs of three early Jesus communities vying for credibility as the Christian church forms. Mary is first to proclaim the risen Jesus, but this version also adds Peter and John racing to the tomb. Peter is first to enter the tomb, but John is the first to arrive and believe. So all three of these early church figures and their communities are competing in this version, and we still have power struggles in the church today.
Every canonical version of the resurrection narrative drives home the importance of believing women when they speak. We can apply this practice in every area of our society today, both within our faith communities and in our larger society.
This coming weekend, most of Western Christianity will celebrate Easter. Perhaps we could deepen our practice of listening to women when they speak by listening to a few perspectives on the crucifixion-resurrection narrative at the heart of so contemporary Christianity.
The perspectives I’m about to share challenge traditional, familiar interpretations of this narrative and many of the atonement theories that have been born from them.
I’ll begin with a short, challenging example from feminist theologian Dr. Elizabeth Bettenhausen and her preface for the classic book, Christianity, Patriarchy, and Abuse.
I want to offer a content warning here: this excerpt contains sexual violence in reimagining the cross event.
“Several years ago I asked a group of seminarians to choose New Testament stories about Jesus and rewrite them imagining that Jesus had been female. The following recreation of the passion story of Luke 22.54-65 was one woman’s knowing by heart.
‘They arrested the Christ woman and led her away to the Council for questioning. Some of her followers straggled along to find out what was to become of her. There were seven women and two men followers. (The men followers were there mainly to keep watch over their sisters.) Someone from among the crowd asked a question of a man follower, ‘Haven’t I seen you with this woman? Who is she, and what is your relationship with her?’ He replied defensively, ‘She is a prostitute, she has had many men. I have seen her with many!’ The men who were guarding the Christ [woman] slapped her around and made fun of her. They told her to use magic powers to stop them. They blindfolded her and each them in turn raped her and afterward jeered, ‘Now, prophetess, who was in you? Which one of us? Tell us that!’ Thy continued to insult her. (Kandice Joyce)
After this story was read aloud, a silence surrounded the class and made us shiver. Ever since, I have wondered would women ever imagine forming a religion around the rape of a woman? Would we ever conjure gang-rape as a salvific event for other women? What sort of god would such an event reveal?” (p. xi)
These are valid questions. How can we reconcile seeing the cross event as a salvific divine act without unintentionally inferring that God’s power to save is rooted in willingness to humiliate, physically denigrate, and violate someone’ body to save others?
This is just one reason I believe we must interpret the Jesus story and the crucifixion-resurrection event not in terms of how someone died, died for us, or was executed. It is a story about how the One who was murdered for social, political, and economic reasons by the state, was brought back to life. This is a story of how life conquers death, love conquers hate, sharing conquers greed, and life giving power conquers death dealing.
Last week I shared a little bit from womanist theologian Dr. Delores Williams last week. This week I’ll add Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas’s book Stand your ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God. She offers some absolute gems about the cross beginning on page 178. As she quotes from Williams, “The cross . . . represents historical evil trying to defeat good.”
She then explains how life overcame death in the Jesus story:
Jesus takes on evil. He takes on and defeats . . . not granting the power of death any authority over him . . . he does not respond in kind, by adopting the methods of this power. The final triumph over the death of the cross is the resurrection of Jesus.
The resurrection is God’s definitive victory over the crucifying powers of evil.
The cross represents the power that denigrates human bodies, destroys life, and preys on the most vulnerable in society. As the cross is defeated, so too is that power.
The impressive factor is how it is defeated. It is defeated by life-giving rather than a life-negating force . . . That is, it is not the power that diminishes the life of another so that others might live. God’s power respects the integrity of all human bodies and the sanctity of all life. This is a resurrecting power.
God’s power never expresses itself through humiliation or denigration of another. It does not triumph over life. It conquers death by resurrecting life.
The force of God is a death-negating, life-affirming force.
Next, Dr. Douglas quotes Audre Lorde: “The masters tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us to temporarily beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change.” (Sister Outsider, p. 112)
Then she continues, “God does not fight death with death. God does not utilize the violence exhibited in the cross to defeat deadly violence itself.”
If indeed the power of life that God stands for is greater than the power of death, this must be manifest in the way God triumphs over death-dealing powers. The freedom of God that is life requires a liberation from the very weapons utilized by a culture of death. In other words, these weapons cannot become divine weapons . . . The culmination of this liberation is Jesus’ resurrection.
This exegesis resonates with me so deeply. Every fiber of my heart says amen! The Jesus story isn’t about a God who overcomes death by adding one more death, i.e. Jesus’ death. It’s the story of a God who overcame, reversed, and undid death by resurrecting the one the state sought to execute.
For me, this is powerful. This is a story that moves us to believe in love’s ability to win, even in the face of death, and to work toward that end.
We can work more effectively for a better iteration of our world when we believe that that better iteration is actually possible. Ultimately, I believe this was a 1st Century story told in 1st Century language that was intended to inspire early Jesus followers to do just that.
This story can still inspire Jesus followers today.
HeartGroup Application
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s eSight/Podcast episode with your HeartGroup.
2. What does interpreting the Jesus story as a story where life overcomes death and love overcomes hate change for you? Share 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.
Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week
Understanding and Sharing a Theology of the Cross with Children: Beyond Substitutionary Atonement
Here’s a conversation on talking to children about the violence of the cross during this holiday weekend that was recorded this spring. Grateful to my friends author and pastor Traci Smith of Elmhurst Presbyterian Church and author Daneen Akers of Holy Troublemakers & Unconventional Saints for this conversation.
Listen at:
Understanding and Sharing a Theology of the Cross with Children: Beyond Substitutionary Atonement
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