Rediscovering the Message of Lent
Often, Lent means very little. Modern American Christianity tends to leap from a cross of ashes borne on Ash Wednesday right into the glory of Easter.
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Lent begins early this year because of a very early date for Easter in most Christian churches. On February 12, Ash Wednesday ushers in the season of Sundays on which Christians are asked to contemplate Jesus’ way to his death. Traditional piety has made Lent a period of self-examination, recognition of sinfulness, and seeking reconciliation with God on the basis of the sacrifice of God’s Son on the cross of Golgotha. Often, of course, Lent means very little. Modern American Christianity tends to leap from a cross of ashes, casually borne on one’s forehead on Ash Wednesday, right into the glory of Easter. Even Good Friday is barely observed and is not a public holiday anyway. However, where this traditional Christian piety is still meaningful, it tends to be no more than a private affair. The Gospel readings for the Lenten season speak a different language.
Jesus’ first prediction of his suffering and death (Mark 8:31) follows upon Peter’s confession of Jesus as the Messiah. “Messiah” does not mean “your personal savior”; rather, the Messiah is the one who will come to establish a new order of the world that will end suppression, discrimination, hunger, poverty and misery. Jesus accepts this designation. Yet his response to Peter contains a radical qualification: this Messiah will not conquer the world through power and domination but through suffering and death. Jesus’ prediction that this Messiah is the Son of Man who will have to suffer and die turns the traditional expectations of the Messiah’s role upside down. God does not come into the world in order to make an alliance with the rich and mighty, nor will he use power against power and force against force. Rather, in Jesus as the Messiah, God joins the party of the poor, the hungry and those who suffer persecution. This challenges the legitimacy of every political, social and economic system that allows the poor to go hungry. It establishes for the faithful Christian a fundamental suspicion of the ways of this world and of its institutions.
John 2:13–22 describes how Jesus drives out the money-changers from the Temple. It is Jesus’ first public appearance, and it challenges a long-standing and time-honored system. Not only the Temple in Jerusalem, but other major temples throughout the Roman world were important banking institutions. Since temples were sacrosant, money deposited in them was protected. It was only natural that the changing of currency as well as major sales contracts were negotiated in the Temple—not in the inner sanctum, of course, but in one of the outer courts; these activities would not interfere with regular worship and sacrifices. Then why this expulsion of the necessary and customary business activities? Jesus attacks an established institution of the society. The banking business of the Temple, from which especially the priests, that is, members of the aristocracy, drew great benefits, was one of the pillars of the ancient economy and thus an important instrument of suppression.
John 3:16 famously speaks of God, “who so loved the world that he gave his only son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.” How then does Jesus become the savior of the world? “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up” (John 3:14)—namely, on the cross; that is his glorification. Glorification, for the Gospel of John, is not the resurrection of Jesus but his death. This is discussed in another Gospel text for the season of Lent, John 12:20–33. There were some Greeks who wanted to see Jesus because of all his wonderful deeds. When Philip and Andrew communicate this request to Jesus, he answers that “the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified” (John 12:23). The following verses make clear that this glorification is his death: only the seed that dies bears much fruit (John 12:24). When Jesus continues to speak about his “being lifted up from the earth” (John 12:32), the author of the Gospel adds, “He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die” (John 12:33). Jesus’ “ascension” is his being lifted up on the cross. According to the Gospel of John, God saves the world precisely through that which has least dignity in the world, namely suffering and death.
The Roman governor Pontius Pilate wonders why King Jesus is not protected by a bodyguard and why his troops are not fighting for him. Jesus answers that his kingdom is “not from this world”; were it from this world, his followers would be fighting for him (John 18:33–38). What is meant by “not from this world”? The standard criteria for success in “this world”—power, force, domination, manipulation and exploitation—are no longer applicable if God’s power is manifest in this world in suffering and death. That is the truth for which Jesus is a witness, to which Pilate can answer only with the evasive question, 046“What is truth?” (John 18:38). This kind of truth eludes the standards of political expediency.
This creates an uncomfortable relationship with the world and its rulers, powers and dominating institutions. Christians are constantly tempted to establish their own power, their own values and their own success in this world. In ancient times, they hailed the emperor Constantine when he made Christianity the preferred religion of the state. Today there are many who desire to impose their vision of a law-abiding society upon other people. According to the Gospel, however, God in Jesus is not present in power and success but among those who are on the wrong end of the exercise of power as it is practiced in this world. Lent is not meant to provide comfort for the feelings of sinfulness of those who are comfortable. Rather, the Gospel texts for Lent raise suspicion against the wielding of power in this world as a means of salvation.
Lent begins early this year because of a very early date for Easter in most Christian churches. On February 12, Ash Wednesday ushers in the season of Sundays on which Christians are asked to contemplate Jesus’ way to his death. Traditional piety has made Lent a period of self-examination, recognition of sinfulness, and seeking reconciliation with God on the basis of the sacrifice of God’s Son on the cross of Golgotha. Often, of course, Lent means very little. Modern American Christianity tends to leap from a cross of ashes, casually borne on one’s forehead on Ash Wednesday, right into […]
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