Does what you believe in make sense? Does it make sense to you? Why?
History sometimes acts as a razor against our beliefs. History demonstrates to us what is possible,
from what is impossible. When we examine
our lives through the lens of History, what do we find? Are our beliefs supported by the facts of
History, or by tales we have told so long they have reached mythic proportions
but have yet to include any certain demonstrable facts. This is not a 20th century problem
or dilemma, this is a phenomenon that has gripped mankind since the fall in the
Garden of Eden until now. You only
needed to live 1100 years or so after the fall, to have lost the first-person
account of what happened there in form of Adam and Eve. By then, only Seth could recount the stories
his parents had told him, even though he himself had never been in that famous
Garden.
But then, no one had.
An angel stood at its entrance, armed with a flaming sword, intent on
keeping all interested parties out, so man could not again eat from the Tree of
Life and find himself immortal. As a
side note, what is the point of guarding this entrance if the soul of man is
immortal anyway? It was guarded because
upon death we sleep, knowing nothing, until our Lord returns to us and pulls us
out of our rotten slumber and in to a life only He could create, re-create, or
restore. In this context, an angelic
guard is needed, and was present.
Mankind could see this angel all the way up until the flood (when it is
likely the Garden was relocated to heaven, until it could be returned to a New
Earth after the end of all evil). What
you believed was not important. Go to
the entrance of the Garden and what you found was an armed angel to keep you
out. Nearly 4,000 years pass by this
way.
But a demonstration of the divine does not repel evil. During the 4,000 years man became so evil, it
made God sorry He made us; excepting for Noah, and Noah far from perfect. Pass by another few centuries after the flood
to the time of Moses. The children of
Israel witness miracles beyond what History could have ever dictated. They pass through the Red Sea, and have a
cloud of perfect temperature in a desert of normally scorching heat. The snakes and creatures of the desert remain
hidden in their dens while Israelite feet are nearby. At night, the cloud turns into a pillar of
fire, providing light, and heat in a desert that is otherwise very cold and
dark. And nocturnal wildlife stay home
while Israelite feet are nearby. Forty
years of these conditions, but evil arises from time to time, sometimes in
nearly absolute rebellion. What you
believed did not matter, over your head was a cloud, or a pillar of fire,
depending on the time of day. But pass
by only a century later, and all that remains are the written accounts of
Moses. A century more, and writings are
everything.
And now Jesus has reached the scene. He is preaching and teaching. He is healing, loving, and restoring us. And the leadership of His church rejects Him
for want of power over the people. Was
it stupid to believe in a still coming Messiah that Jesus now embodies? Was it stupid to believe in Adam and Eve, and
a talking snake? Was it stupid to
believe in Moses, and the miracles of the sky that happened every day while in
the deserts of the Middle East? Crowds
of Israelites now wrestle with these beliefs because once again there is a
material witness to the facts of History, instead of just the stories of
History. The leadership tell the people
that Jesus is a blasphemer. They tell
the people that Jesus is a false prophet, possessed of the Devil himself. To listen to Jesus is to be expelled from the
Temple, cast away from the sacrificial system whereby salvation can be
achieved. To be expelled is to cut one’s
self off from the forgiveness of sins.
Or is it?
Matthew now recounts in his gospel a story in three
parts. In act one, the context is
set. It picks up in chapter nine
beginning in verse 18 it says … “While he spake these things unto them, behold,
there came a certain ruler, and worshipped him, saying, My daughter is even now
dead: but come and lay thy hand upon her, and she shall live. [verse 19] And
Jesus arose, and followed him, and so did his disciples.” So many things to unpack in only two
verses. First, at the beginning of this
chapter, Jesus told a man his sins were forgiven him, then proved it by healing
him from a lifelong debilitating disease.
This meant, that being cut off from the Temple was no longer a death
sentence of retaining one’s sins. Being
attached to Jesus was to find the only real outlet for the forgiveness of one’s
sins. The threat of the Temple
leadership is no longer what it once might have been. But this is what happens when God replaces
men at the center of our religion.
Next, understand the position this supplicant maintains
before this encounter. He is a
ruler. This would mean that up until
this request of Jesus he was in the Sanhedrin or ruling class. He did not suffer from poverty, or even
oppression by the Romans. He was
respected. He likely had servants,
nearly all rulers did. In worshipping
Jesus publicly, he would be putting everything he had at risk. The Romans were not certain of Jesus yet, but
He was being watched. Anyone associated
with Jesus would join that watch list, but anyone rich doing it would draw
intense scrutiny. The Romans did not
need a worshipper capable of funding a war against them. Poor folks were only desperate. The rich could accomplish quite a bit
more. Worshipping Jesus publicly
declared to his family and friends where his allegiances would lie. He was out.
He was public. He would be
immediately cast aside by the Temple leadership, and you can believe, lies
would be crafted about him right away to make this “sin” worse.
And finally, he was stupid.
What else do you call it, when someone believes something that History
has never demonstrated is possible? What
else do you call it, when you search for life from a condition beyond the grave
where death has already set in? Is that
resurrection, or is it salvation? Do you
see the condition of death you abide in today?
Your heart beats, your lungs move, but your “life” is one of pain, death,
and mediocrity. You “live” only a tenth
of what you could. Not because of poor
health, or poor means, but because of poor thinking. You trust to the habit of trying to save
yourself from your sins, trying to gut-it-out and not commit certain things you
know are wrong. But all the while the
desire to do those things is as strong as it ever was. Failure heaped upon failure. And History acts as a razor against your
beliefs. But it is not Jesus that is
wrong about what you believe, it is what you think the role of Jesus is. Jesus is the source of whatever new life you
are bound to have. Jesus cleans you
up. Jesus takes away the desires you
cannot remove. And salvation from the
“death” you abide in, begins to take place.
Now who is the stupid one?
And note the response of Jesus to this request to breathe
life back into what is now dead. Jesus
does not ponder the idea. Jesus does not
send it out to committee to insure there is a consensus before He takes
action. Jesus drops what He is doing and
immediately leaves to find the home of this little girl, because of the request
of her father. It is not the faith of
the dead one that will be tested here.
It is only her father that through his humility and submission to Jesus
has sparked what will happen next. Let
the world think of him what they will, this father has a plan to see love
restored. This father has a plan to see
the love of his little girl burn bright in her eyes once again. This father has buried his hope and his faith
in the person of Jesus Christ. Whether
we think that stupid or not. And Jesus
is moving, moving right away. Those who
will follow Jesus are indeed following after Him. For Jesus always moves decisively towards
seeing life return to the dead, even when that condition is only spiritual.
What this ruler did, is what you and I do, asking for life
in the context of our death, each and every day. If we have never witnessed salvation against
death, it is because we have never really allowed Jesus to fix what is dead
within us. This was not a story of a
father raising his daughter from the grave.
This was a request by a father for Jesus to do, what only Jesus can do,
bring life. This father makes that
request, no matter how stupid it sounds to those around him. No matter what history has demonstrated,
History is about to be up-ended. There
will be a new History after this. There
will be a new set of facts from which we can derive a belief. There will be a new set of
eye-witnesses. But then over time, all
that will remain again is the written word of this account. And centuries past that, the written word
will be everything. The story will not
prevent all evil, but it will demonstrate the power of Jesus against evil and
the death it brings.
Is it stupid to believe what you have not seen
yourself? Is it stupid to rely upon the
witnesses of others? What about
believing something you do not at heart think is possible. The power of Jesus is beyond what you could
ever imagine. No matter what others
believed, there was an Angel in front of the Garden for 4,000 years. There was a cloud over the desert, and a
pillar of fire at night for 40 years.
There was our God on earth in the form of Jesus Christ for 33.5
years. And now, there is a tried and
true way, for you to see the death of your life ended, and a real “life” beyond
the imagination of this existence waiting for you in the here and now, not just
in some far removed afterwards. Find
Jesus, give to him what you call your life, and watch what He does with it.
And this was only the first act of three in this story …
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