Stephen
Terry, Director
Jesus,
the Mediator of the New Covenant
Commentary
for the February 19, 2022, Sabbath School Lesson
"Here I am! I stand at the door and
knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with
that person, and they with me." Revelation 3:20, NIV
Have you ever been watching a
football game and your team is inside the ten-yard line with less than a minute
of game time remaining? It is first in ten and a field goal will not win the
game. Only a touch down will do. The quarterback begins calling the signals and
your doorbell rings. As you head for the door, you hear the crowd cheering
behind you for the play that won the game, the play you missed only to find a
door-to-door salesperson offering a service you have no use for. Though the salesperson
is only trying to make a living, we harden our hearts and the "No Solicitors"
sign goes up the next day.
Our relationship to Jesus may
be like that. He stands knocking, but we either just do not have the time or
the desire to open the door. We may tell ourselves that we would, but every
time we shut someone out, we are doing so to Jesus. The Parable of the Sheep
and the Goats in Matthew, chapter 25 reveals that whether we open the door or
keep it closed fast, we will not realize we ae doing it to Jesus, just that it
is only another person in need of our attention.[i] It
can be hard to set our own plans aside for someone else. But Jesus' death on
the cross epitomized that idea. Despite the love that breached that immense
gulf between humanity and the ineffable glory of God, he humbled himself beyond
all measure to restore what has all but disappeared for humanity. But after
doing so, he often finds the door shut to him and impervious to his gentle
knocking. It is ironic that the one who created the trees that went to make the
door should allow that wood to bar him from our lives, but metaphorically it
illustrates that his love is so great for us that he will not force us to love him
in return.
We like to believe we are
loving one another like Jesus asked, but divorce statistics tell a different
story with just under 50 percent of marriages ending in divorce.[ii]
For this reason and general lack of love for one another, a burgeoning legal
profession has grown to guide us through all the legal ins and outs of our
hatred for one another. It is not surprising that the wall of lawyers surrounding
the wealthy, from elected government officials to corporate officers, is as
effective at facilitating indifference and aloofness as the metaphorical door excluding
Christ.
But they are not alone. God's professed followers have done an excellent job at
exclusion as well. While Jesus invites all who would come, I have seen churches
circle their wagons to exclude those who do not dress right, who do not like
the right kind of music, or who are needy and poor. They will even cite scripture
to support their discrimination. But like Jesus at the door, they refuse to let
into their hearts scripture that would challenge that discrimination. We fail
to understand that looking for scripture to confirm our prejudices is not Bible
study. It is simply looking for more bricks to wall up our hearts toward
others. Often, texts used in this way come from the Pentateuch and that reflects
a time when men's hearts were very hardened.[iii]
The Bible attests to this through the sacrificial system set up under Aaron and
the Levitical Priesthood. Vast herds of animals died terrified, bloody deaths
for centuries to atone for the evil that never seemed to entirely abate. The
human heart tends to abuse such systems. Instead of seeing the abhorrence of
evil, they see penance as a "get-out-of-jail-free card." In other words, "if animals
have to die so I can go to heaven, that is a price I am willing to pay." A form
of this continues with the modern-day confessional with its ritualistic penance
and absolution. The priests who condone this have more in common with Levites
than with Christ.
Even though he is credited for
setting it all up, God detests such manipulation of an opportunity for a fresh
start. He desires mercy, not sacrifices. First stated by the prophet Hosea,
Jesus quoted this thought twice in the gospel of Matthew.[iv]
Strangely, only in Christ's death upon the cross do we see reference to the
innocent dying because of sin, and even though he is called the Lamb of God, we
see no reference to the innocence of the myriad lambs slaughtered because of
our perfidy toward God and our fellow human beings. Isaiah revealed that God abhors
the way we treat one another while claiming to be doing what scripture demands.[v]He
points out ways we should care for others, never basing it on their worthiness.
Their need alone is the criteria. Not only do we continue evil behavior to one
another, but we have the cheek to believe that the sacrificial system makes it
OK.
If we feel tempted to believe this
does not apply to us because the sacrificial system ended with the crucifixion,
we are not safe because we can do the same thing with Calvary. We can engage in
the fallacious idea that we can abuse others and just like those Old Testament
miscreants, we can sacrifice a lamb, in this case Jesus, and we will be back in
the Christ Club in good and regular standing. But we are deceiving ourselves.
It was never about the sacrifices. Those Levitical sacrifices could not take
away our sins.[vi]
But Christ's sacrifice hit us square in the face and did for us what those
animal sacrifices could not do. It revealed the lengths to which we were
willing to go to avoid opening our hearts to God and our fellow human beings.
We would even slay God himself to avoid that.
We are wretched human beings.
We talk of war as though it is nothing to violently sweep all our enemies into a
bloody grave. Even when we do not have the power to take their lives, we murder
them with our words either directly to their face, pushing for violent
confrontation or by character assassination behind their back. Every person we
would do this to is Christ re-crucified with our tongues or our fists driving
the nails hard and fast. Sadly, perhaps because of jealousy, the last things
some want to allow another human being is hope and peace. But it does not have
to be that way.
Or hearts may be like granite.
We may lose ourselves in narcissistic pursuits, but in the quiet moments, the
knocking persists. We may have disconnected the doorbell. We may have turned up
the noise and activity in our lives so that we cannot hear the gentle knock,
but despite all that, whether we hear it or not, it persists. Parcel delivery
services may do all they feel they can to deliver a package to our door, but
none has the persistence of Jesus. Porch pirates cannot steal what he offers because
he stands there until someone opens the door, however long it takes. He does
this because what he brings is more precious than winning the Publisher's
Clearing House Sweepstakes. It does not come with fanfare or balloons. It comes
quietly on the wings of the Holy Spirit.
What is this precious gift? For
it is a gift, we do nothing to earn it. We only open the door to receive it.
Ezekiel tells us it is spiritual cardiac surgery. We give God our stony,
hardened heart, and he gives us a heart of flesh.[vii]
God created us in his image, loving and compassionate, but we have made
ourselves like flint. Restoring to us a heart like Creation caused to beat in
our chest will provide fertile ground for compassion, empathy, and love to
grow. It is not like Jack's magic beanstalk that grew up overnight, but new
shoots will soon be evident. Humanity once erred and lost its place in the
Garden of Eden, but that garden can still grow in our hearts. The soil of Eden
still exists in hidden corners of our being, ready to respond to the light of
God's presence to nurture rebirth and new growth. Although we may not currently
walk its verdant pathways, the peace of Eden can still exist in our hearts.
The knocking persists. Who will
open the door so that the Holy Spirit can breathe into their hearts the smells,
sounds, and sights of Eden to remind us of where we are from and to light the
pathway home? We have wandered so long through harsh, dry, and desolate places,
squabbling over what little this world offers us. It offers so much tinsel and
glitter and hope of wealth and fame, but as we age and our bodies crumble under
the weight of repeated heartaches and disease, as we become inured to any idea
of hope in this tormented world, we discover the lie we have bought into, the
lie that this world is all there is so grab all you can before you die. We are
all citizens of a better place, and the underground railroad is waiting to take
us from slavery to freedom. Do you hear the knocking?