Long Ago God Spoke (8-31-14)
Part 18: Setting One’s Face
Hebrews 4: The High Priest Who Cried Out in Pain
14-16 Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help. Luke 9:51-54 When it came close to the time for his Ascension, he gathered up his courage and steeled himself for the journey to Jerusalem. He sent messengers on ahead. They came to a Samaritan village to make arrangements for his hospitality. But when the Samaritans learned that his destination was Jerusalem, they refused hospitality. When the disciples James and John learned of it, they said, “Master, do you want us to call a bolt of lightning down out of the sky and incinerate them?”
55-56 Jesus turned on them: “Of course not!” And they traveled on to another village.
57 On the road someone asked if he could go along. “I’ll go with you, wherever,” he said.
58 Jesus was curt: “Are you ready to rough it? We’re not staying in the best inns, you know.”
Jesus said to another, “Follow me.”
59 He said, “Certainly, but first excuse me for a couple of days, please. I have to make arrangements for my father’s funeral.”
60 Jesus refused. “First things first. Your business is life, not death. And life is urgent: Announce God’s kingdom!”
61 Then another said, “I’m ready to follow you, Master, but first excuse me while I get things straightened out at home.”
62 Jesus said, “No procrastination. No backward looks. You can’t put God’s kingdom off till tomorrow. Seize the day.”
Jesus said, ‘No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God’ (Luke 9:62).
Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession(Hebrews 4:14).
You only know as much of the text as you put into practice.(A principal of Pope Gregory the Great (in office 590-604) as noted by Robert J. Karris, on the flyleaf of Luke, A Commentary by John Carroll (Westminster John Knox Press, 2012).)The Wesleyan Center for Twenty-First Century Studies at Point Loma Nazarene University used to publish a newsletter several times a year. The title of the publication was “Along the Way.” The title was adopted with John Wesley in mind. During his lifetime Wesley traveled thousands of miles on horseback.(See T. Ferrier Hulme, John Wesley and His Horse (The Epworth Press, 1933).)gone on his way many miles by horseback but most of us get here and there by car or by walking.
Pyrrho, an ancient skeptic, chose to walk. Trying to keep his walk consistent with his thought Pyrrho took no precautions, making it necessary that someone accompany him to prevent him from being hurt. According to Diogenes Laertius Pyrrho faced “all the risks as they came, whether carts, precipices, dogs or what not, and generally leaving nothing to the arbitrament of the senses; but he was kept out of harm’s way by his friends who. . . used to follow close after him.” Moreover, Pyrrho “would maintain the same composure at all times, so that even if you left him when he was in the middle of a speech, he would finish what he had to say with no audience but himself. . . .” (Quotations derived from Giovanni Reale, A History of Ancient Philosophy, vol. III: The Systems of the Hellenistic Age, edited and translated by John R. Catan (State University of New York Press, 1985), 323.) have been to relinquish his skepticism by admitting the departure of those who had stood there listening to him! Pyrrho was not only on the way but in the way when it came to his friends.
Seeing life as a journey, as being ‘along the way,’ ‘on the way,’ or even ‘in the way’ is not all that uncommon. In fact one could well speak of journey in terms of ‘by the way!’ These four catch phrases serve as a suggestive outline for examining a segment of scripture in Luke that complement two exhortations in Hebrews.
On the Way
A number of books on spirituality do so including some that are Christian and others that are not. On the national scene M. Scott Peck is noted for his book with its well-known title, The Road Less Traveled(4See M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth (Simon and Schuster, 1978). For a conservative critique of Peck, see e.g., H. Wayne House and Richard Abanes, The Less Traveled Road and the Bible: A Scriptural Critique of the Philosophy of M. Scott Peck (Horizon Books, 1995).). As a psychiatrist and best selling author, Peck shares experiences drawn from his clients and his own personal reflections. Reading Peck’s book critically reveals a number of problematic issues, including how God is defined and how transcendence is to be understood. However in terms of seeing life as a journey Peck provides much to reflect upon. The opening line of his work is that “Life is difficult.” This is termed
a great truth, one of the greatest truths. It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it. Once we truly know that life is difficult--once we truly understand and accept it--then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters (15).
Where people have problems, Peck believes, is in the assumption that life should be easy. For him life is a series of problems. “Do we want to moan about them or solve them? Do we want to teach our children to solve them?” The remedy is discipline. Without discipline we are said to solve nothing. With what he calls “total discipline” we can solve all problems. This discipline is to be lived out as we journey through life. Maturity is facing up to reality, of stepping into the future, of risking ourselves, along the way. By the time Peck nears the end of his book he is able to relate that, in the practice of psychiatry, one of the prominent factors is that patients are “amazingly healthy mentally.” This surprising aspect is accounted for by “a force, the mechanics which we do not fully understand, that seems to operate routinely in most people to protect and to foster their mental health even under the most adverse conditions” (327-238). He terms this factor “amazing grace” and sees this grace or force at work in numerous ways.
It is in numerous ways that the biblical texts from Luke’s gospel and Hebrews help us to confront ourselves in today’s lesson. Luke 9:51 begins a new phase in Luke’s Gospel. The text begins an extended travel narrative with Jesus who has set his face on Jerusalem (9:51-19:48).(As Luke Timothy Johnson points out, from 9:51 until Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem (19:28) “the reader is constantly reminded that Jesus is ‘on the way’ (9:52, 56,57; 10:38; 13:33), and specifically ‘on the way to Jerusalem’ (9:53; 10:1; 13:22, 31; 14:25; 17:11; 18:31, 35;19:1, 11, 28).” See Luke Timothy
Johnson, The Gospel of Luke, Sacra Pagina Series, vol. 3 (The Liturgical Press, 1991), 164.) others who refuse to do so. Constant throughout is the presence of his disciples who are being ‘educated’ in the ways of discipleship. The theme of discipleship is also at work in Along the way Jesus encounters some who turn his way and the Hebrews text. Here those who follow Jesus are being encouraged to remain faithful, to hold fast to what they have been taught (Heb. 4:14). The full significance of what the Hebrews writer has to say about the Son as the all-sufficient High Priest is still to come. The Aaronic high priesthood will be shown to be limited when compared to what has been accomplished by the Son. Thus the Hebrews excerpt this morning serves as an invitation and preamble by the author to stand fast even in the midst of difficulties.
In the Way(The motif ‘in the way’ could be taken in two ways. It could be taken as standing in the way,
of being an obstacle or impediment to a course of action. But ‘in the way’ could, as meant here, suggest
involvement, of being identified with and committed to a person, cause or activity.)
Joel Green notes that five themes characterize this extended travel section in Luke (9:51-19:48), each of which reinforces what has appeared earlier in Luke’s gospel. Thus the themes serve to summarize Luke’s gospel. First, the coming of salvation for all people is prominent with Jesus’ mission portrayed as that of seeking and saving the lost (19:10). Second, the expectation that Jesus would be the cause of division in Israel has been predicted (9:22) and will now appear more frequently. Third, death looms large in the narrative. Irrespective of the issue--discipleship or whatever--it becomes more difficult to separate the issue from Jesus’ journey toward death. Fourth, it is obvious that the disciples are not clear with respect to the nature of Jesus’ divine mission and the character of their own discipleship. The need for more intense ‘attention’ on their part becomes apparent. Finally, the narrative features less the idea of a travelogue, from Galilee to Jerusalem and more the motif of journeying and its destination, Jerusalem. “The way” figures prominently, so that it is not surprising that in Luke’s second work, the book of Acts, the
Jesus’ movement is characterized as “ the Way” (Acts 9:2; 19:9, 23; 22:4; 24:14, 22).(Joel B. Green, The Gospel of Luke (William B. Eerdmans Publishing company, 1997), 394-399.) With these thoughts in mind, we approach Jesus’ departure for Jerusalem with Luke making it clear that following Jesus means joining him in the journey (9:51-62).
Rejection in a Samaritan Village
(9:51-56).
51“When the day drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. 52And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; 53but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. 54When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, ‘Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?’ 55But he turned and rebuked them. 56Then they went
on to another village.”
The journey to Jerusalem for which 9:21-50 prepares us now begins. As part of a larger section that deals with initiating the disciples into the ways of Jesus (9:51-10:24), the journey does not proceed far before encountering rejection. The way to Jerusalem leads southward, toward a Samaritan village. Jewish pilgrims regularly passed through Samaria on the way to Jerusalem and its feasts. Sometimes, as Josephus notes, there was trouble since the hostility between Jews and Samaritans at the time was well known. Thus it is not unusual to find the messengers sent ahead by Jesus to find that they are not welcome. “They did not receive him because his face was set toward Jerusalem” (9:53). The origin of the unrest between the Samaritans and the Jews is not entirely clear. Traditionally the former have been taken as the descendants of the mixed population settled in Israel after the Assyrian conquest of the Northern Kingdom (2 Kings 17:24-44). More recently Manasseh, the brother of the high priest married the daughter of a Samaritan and was expelled from Jerusalem. He in turn built a temple on Mount Gerizim. In 128 B.C.E. the destruction of that temple caused deep resentment. In time the Samaritans developed their own form of the Pentateuch, their own liturgy and their own religious literature.(See John Nolland, Word Biblical Commentary, vol. 35B: Luke 9:21-18-34 (Word Books, 1993).)
In the present case James and John want to do something about this rejection. “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” (9:54). The response of Jesus is immediate: “He turned and rebuked them.” In his commentary John Nolland notes that “to have ‘the disciples’ followed by names is unparalleled in the Gospel tradition. It may underline the failure here of James and John precisely as disciples.” In any case Jesus and those with him proceed onto another village, whether it was Samaritan or not is not known. Jerusalem with its temple holds no attraction for them.
Following Jesus Without Qualification
(9:57-62).
57“As they were going along the road, someone said to him. ‘I will follow you wherever you go.’ 58And Jesus said to him, ‘Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.’ 59To another he said, ‘ Follow me.’ But he said, ‘Lord, first let me go and bury my father.’ 60But Jesus said to him, ‘Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and
proclaim the kingdom of God.’ 61Another said, ‘I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.’ 62Jesus said to him, ‘No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.’”
The journey began with the anticipation of the persecution that awaits in Jerusalem but the text shows that following Jesus makes radical demands on those who would be his disciples. The journey is not an easy one at times, as three individuals soon learn. As the group proceeds along the road, someone says to Jesus, “I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus responds with “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another person, Jesus invites the individual to “follow me.” The person asks if he can first go and bury his father. What is heard in response may have been surprising: “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” A third would-be-disciple has a similar request as the second person:
“I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus replies: “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
As mentioned Luke often puts together a travel notice with material relating to discipleship. That is especially evident here. In the three pronouncement accounts the cost of discipleship is demanding. Elijah may have allowed Elisha to return home and bid his parents farewell (I Kings 19:19-21) but that is not the case in today’s text. The social amenities of the Hellenistic world do not come into play. A new order is underway; old priorities no longer command allegiance. Jesus is no Elijah! Moreover, let those already dead in the tomb bury their own dead! The inadequacy of even the two disciples is underscored by the reference to James and John earlier. Here are two of the three favored to accompany Jesus in the scene of transfiguration and
who thus heard Jesus and his message legitimated in the most profound way possible, by God himself (9:28-36). Had they in fact ‘listened to him,’ would they not have remembered his words regarding the divine necessity of his rejection?(Green, 406.)
Unable to correlate power and authority with rejection they continue to think improperly. In the case of the two individuals who ask to first do something, they address Jesus as “Lord” but follow that with requests to delay obedience. They, too, show a lack of understanding of what authentic discipleship entails. Indirectly they exhibit a lack of confidence in Jesus himself.
Hebrews 4:14-16
14Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. 15For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. 16Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
These verses are a vital part of being ‘in the way.’(Dr. Frank Carver has already favored us with a detailed exegesis of 4:14-16, in “Mercy and . . . Grace,” Come and Go Class, May 25, 2014.) Placing the Hebrews passage after the Lucan text reinforces the journey motif but more importantly highlights the exhortation to hold fast “to our confession.”(The text is a foretaste of the problem appearing in chapter 6, of dealing with those who have fallen away (6:6). Can they be reclaimed?) In Luke’s terms this is setting one’s face! Confession in this context carries overtones of “being of one mind,” of affirming or declaring wherein one stands. In Kevin Anderson’s words, “Let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.”(Kevin L. Anderson, Hebrews (Beacon Hill Press, 2013), 154.) This first of the two exhortations in 4:14-16 recognizes Jesus’ divine appointment as high priest. “He has gone through the heavens.” For Anderson, “Jesus passed through the transitory, created heavens (1:10-12; 12:26) into the permanent and true sanctuary into heaven itself. . . in God’s presence”(9:24). In the second exhortation, to approach the throne of God with confidence, is based on the Son’s solidarity with those for whom he ministers and yet without sin! The benefits afforded by the Son’s faithfulness are staggering for humanity; to be able to
approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need (4:16).
This confidence is based on the character of the one who has passed through the heavens and now sits at the right hand of God. He is like us in his identification with humanity but yet so much more, as chapters 5-10 show.
By the Way
This lesson began with a reference to Scott Peck’s book, The Road Less Traveled. In 1993 Peck wrote a sequel, Further Along the Road Less Traveled: The Unending Journey Toward Spiritual Growth. More recently he has penned, The Road Less Traveled and Beyond: Spiritual Growth in an Age of Anxiety (1997).(The three books are published by Simon and Schuster.) In this third title Peck concludes with a lengthy poem in which he recalls various incidents drawn from his own journey (287-306). Consider this excerpt:
“I have no desire
To disparage this world.
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You [God] have set it before us
For a purpose. You have laid it out
Like a jigsaw puzzle to which
The box has been lost. But the pieces
Are so colorful we children cannot help
But pick them up and start to play.
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The puzzle is huge.
Eventually it dawns on us
We will never begin to have enough time
To complete it. This may be
A moment for despair, tempting us
To discard You, You [who] are so much larger than us.
Yet, if we are alert, there are other
Lessons to be learned. In fact,
The puzzle is so huge it is amazing
We can put one piece together with another
At all.”
It is easy to fault the disciples for not understanding Jesus, for not getting with the program. After all, they were there, with him, listening to his words, noting his actions. It is also easy to let ourselves off the hook, by saying that over 2000 years separate us
from Jesus. We do not have the luxury that the original disciples had of being there, of learning directly, an argument that Søren Kierkegaard completely rejected!(See Kierkegaard’s Practice in Christianity, Kierkegaard’s Writings, XX (Princeton University Press, 1991), 62-66.) The interesting thing is that we all work with what Peck calls the “jigsaw puzzle.” Life is what it is, whether it is in the first millennium or the third!
To sum up: Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem. The path ‘in the way’ is the same for us today. Discipleship ‘on the way’ is costly, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer pointed out. ‘By the way,’ there are no doubt lessons still to be learned, lives to be transformed, people to be
influenced . . . ‘along the way.’
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First Church of the Nazarene
3901 Lomaland Drive
San Diego, California 92106
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