Lent 2016 (C) 2016-03-21: Reading the Lectionary with my family
(I encourage you to read the full text. Hold me accountable if you feel it has not been handled well. It is what Scripture means when it says to wrestle with the Bible and mentally struggle with it and inwardly digest it.)
Why do you want to be a priest? "Because I feel called to be set apart: to bear the cost of sin upon myself for others; to love God's people so much that I would suffer their shame, their guilt, their agony, and their filth for them; to be their scapegoat holding their sin while accepting their scorn, judgement, derision, and mockery. I would be a priest to become last, so that they might be first."
We have the notion of priest (or in modern protestant lingo the "pastor") rather muddled in our modern christian minds. A professor and friend of mine (Rev. Ephraim Radner) wrote a brilliant commentary on Leviticus. In it he shows how God established in the Levitical Law the context of the Cross - the imagery, the movements, the choreography - that would help us recognize and understand the work Jesus would do on the Cross and through the grave. Ephraim pushes us to see how we have misinterpreted the Law and misunderstood the elements of our faith; he shows how the Law forms a chord through Scripture which unites prophecy to history to enable proper understanding of the Gospel - he shows how the Gospel permeates and thus fulfills every jot and tittle of Scripture just as Jesus tells us.
Consider the notion of priest which Hebrews and Isaiah point toward today. The priest is not the honoured pristine reservoir of perfect pure faith (as we often view him today) - the priest is the putrid casket bearing sin that must be destroyed for the people. The High Priest was never meant to be a station of prestige and authority. God uses His High Priest "to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon." The true High Priest is the suffering servant, the man who absorbs and carries sin before God to bear the penalty for the sake of all people.
We are so like the people of Jerusalem. Today let us be confronted and convicted by Jesus' words "You are [...] teachers and do you not understand these things?" The passion narrative is an intricately woven tapestry - so much is missed, misread and misunderstood if we fail to wrestle with the text. Our presumptions and preconceptions and pretext distort our readings.
We are reminded today of God's desire for the "priest" so we might glimpse and begin to understand the sheer depravity of our nature. This week we will watch as man's "high priest" devises and orchestrates the murder of God's true High Priest. But, as we watch we witness God's Love. God takes this murder by the Law and He transforms it into the perfect sacrifice according to the Law. God Loves us; He will bend everything, even our evil and sin toward our good. Our God is truly a God of restoration.
The question of the passion of Christ is "Do you love me?" Is it no or is it yes?
