The Judge Must Be Crazy

In the beginning God … created the heaven and the earth.

In the beginning … was the Word.

In the beginning there was … no sin. Was there? Then Adam bit into it – and the world was changed. Adam, – Adam meaning the man, the archetypal human being, – distrusted his Creator and took his own way in the world. That meant he learned about death, and sin, and folly, and loss.

And yet, God sent his own Son, to take the form of a human being, to take the form of Adam – that archetypal human being, and, as the Son of Man, he became the new archetype, the new model of what a human being can be – and is.

God sent his Son not to condemn the world but to redeem the world. We do well to remember that judgment was vindication, to the poor, the innocent, and the oppressed, the ones that Jesus came to, and he was their Judge – in the sense that he was their vindicator and defender.

It all reminds me of the worst play I ever saw… well, second worst, if you count the musical version of Major Barbara I sat through in college….

The Caucasian Chalk Circle: The Musical – put on by students at Carlmont High School. Oh, brother.

One of the best plays I ever saw was – The Caucasian Chalk Circle, by Bertolt Brecht, put on by Arena Stage. In it the story of the judgment of Solomon is changed: a rich woman has abandoned her child, a poor woman has taken it as her own and raised it – and now the rich woman wants it back. Azdak, the judge, who has a habit of judging in favor of the poor and oppressed, comes up with a test:

A circle of chalk is drawn and the child is placed in the center. The true mother, says the judge, will be able to pull the child from the center. If they both pull, they will tear the child in half and get half each. The test begins but the poor woman refuses to pull, as she cannot bear to hurt the child. The judge gives her one more chance, but again she cannot pull the child. The judge then declares that the poor woman is the true mother, as she loves the child too much to be able to hurt him.

The judge appears on the stage not to condemn the innocent but to save them: he is the vindicator of the poor and the oppressed. How crazy! How just.

Later, Abraham could have chosen to depend solely on his own efforts – to be a self-made man. “If Abraham was justified by works he has something to boast about,” as the apostle Paul says. But Abraham depended on God – and it was his faith that made him right in the eyes of God. He was a brave man, he worked hard, and he took risks we would hardly dare to take – today would you walk from Baghdad to Cairo and back to Jerusalem? But he depended on God. His life was in God’s hands and it was safe there.

Adam was disobedient and faithless, left the Garden in shame, under a curse. Abraham was obedient and faithful, left the land of his fathers in hope – headed toward promise, under the blessing. Jesus, the son of Adam, is even more the child of Abraham, bringing to us the fulfillment of the promise – that ‘all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’

Nicodemus, a member of the council, is a leader of his people: responsible, brilliant, resourceful, powerful; yet, there is something missing – and he comes to Jesus by night. Being born from above, being born again: this requires becoming vulnerable again, beginning again. He knows he must expose his soul without the carapace of power if he is truly to live.

And then, Jesus tells him: the wind – the spirit, the pneuma, the breath of God – blows where it chooses, and you do not know where it comes from or goes. You have no control over the Spirit.

How can these things be? How, asks the accomplished and prominent member of the council, can a person – with all my advantages and achievements – give it all up to start over? How could he so humble himself? Could he give up all he has, all he has acquired and accumulated, for this one great thing – the gift of life?

He will have to give up his position, won’t he? Or at least admit that what he has based his life on is all wrong, and make the consequences? Take on a new life, based on a new reality?

It seems unlikely – it’s way too hard. It’s asking too much of a man, to start fresh.

And yet later Nicodemus, along with Joseph of Arimathea, is there to receive Jesus’ body in his arms when his body was taken from the Cross. (John 19:39-42)

Something changed for him – something in Jesus’ message, that day, long ago, when he was the vulnerable one. He had been born anew.

His life has found its meaning – his inheritance as a child of Abraham has been fulfilled; he becomes an heir to the promise as he based his life on faith.

He has been born into the promise of Abraham at last; he has received the vindication of God’s justice, and he is saved, not by his own accomplishments and advantages, but by his faith, as innocent and dependent as a newborn child, in God, “the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.” (Romans 4:17)

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ALent2
Genesis 12:1-4a
Psalm 33:12-22
Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
John 3:1-17
JRL+

Johannine ‘double-words’ (from www.preachingpeace.org):

Nuktos (night)
Semeia (signs)
Anothen (again/above)
Pneuma (spirit/wind/breath)
Hupsao (exalt/lift up)



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Sources & Resources for Study and Preaching

Bibliography

Abingdon Bible Commentary (1929)

David Adam,
Clouds and Glory: Prayers for the Church Year: Year A (London: SPCK, 1998)
Traces of Glory: Prayers for the Church Year: Year B (London: SPCK, 1999)
Glimpses of Glory: Prayers for the Church Year: Year C (SPCK, 2000)

Christopher Irvine,
The Pilgrims' Manual (Glasgow: Wild Goose, 1997)

Herbert O'Driscoll, The Word Today: Reflections on the Readings of the Revised Common Lectionary: Year A, Volume 1 (Toronto: Anglican Book Centre, 1998)

Nicholas Thomas (Tom) Wright,
Matthew for Everyone, ed. 2 (London: SPCK, 2004)

Barbara E. Reid,
New Collegeville Bible Commentary: The Gospel According to Matthew (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2005)

Fred B. Craddock, John H. Hayes, Carl R. Holladay, Gene M. Tucker,
Preaching Through the Christian Year: Year A (Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 1992)

Mary Hinkle Shore, Herman C. Waetjen, Richard Eslinger, Melinda A. Quivik,
New Proclamation: Year A, 2007-2008: Advent through Holy Week (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2007)

The Lectionary Page http://www.io.com/~kellywp/index.html

The (Online) Book of Common Prayer http://www.bcponline.org/

Oremus Bible Browser http://bible.oremus.org/



Michael Hardin, Jeff Krantz & Anthony Bartlett,
Preaching Peace http://www.preachingpeace.org/

Anthony Bartlett,
Bible Studies at Preaching Peace http://www.preachingpeace.org/biblestudies.htm

Paul Nuechterlein,
Girardian Reflections on the Lectionary http://www.girardianlectionary.net/

Jenee Woodard, ed.,
The Text this Week http://www.textweek.com/

Mark I. Wallace and Theophus H. Smith, editors,
Curing Violence: Essays on René Girard (Polebridge Press, 1994)
http://www.westarinstitute.org/Polebridge/curing.html

Gil Bailie,
The Cornerstone Forum http://www.test-cornerstone.org/index.html

René Girard,
"Violence and the Cross", CTNS Forum, The Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, February 11, 2003. http://www.ctns.org/news.html