. . . birds came along and devoured it . . . it withered away . . . it yielded no grain . . .”
-Mark 4:4, 6, 7.

Parables are usually connected to a scripture text or several of them. They often explain something puzzling about God and his relation to his people, or something unstated or mysterious in a text.

Yeshua understood a startling truth found in Isaiah 6, one that naturally leads any thoughtful reader to ask questions. Modern readers of the Sower parable (Mk 4; Mt 13; Lk 8) tend not to realize that the parable is commenting on a text. The text is Isaiah 6. It is not a randomly chosen or obscure passage. It is the chapter in which Isaiah saw God’s Throne above with his kingly robes coming down and filling the Temple (Isa 6:1). It is the “holy, holy, holy” passage with the Seraphim (the burning ones). It is the commission of the prophet Isaiah.

Yeshua, prophet and Messiah, has a mission which can be compared to Isaiah’s. Yet the puzzling thing about Isaiah’s commission is that he was sent to tell the people about God’s desire for them in that moment in history and yet his words would paradoxically cause greater judgment. God said to Isaiah:

Go, say to that people: ‘Hear, indeed, but do not understand; see, indeed, but do not grasp.’ Dull that people’s mind, stop its ears, and seal its eyes — lest, seeing with its eyes and hearing with its ears, it also grasp with its mind, and repent and save itself.
-Isaiah 6:9-10, JPS.

These words are so surprising, so ironic, many readers need to give them multiple readings to understand what they are saying.

Isaiah was a kingdom prophet. Yeshua was a kingdom prophet. The kingdom is God’s rule over his people and all the cosmos. Isn’t telling people about the kingdom good news? On the contrary, in many cases it is bad news. The simple in understanding think that true instruction will be easily recognized and that great promises will be believed and acted upon.

The easiest criticism of Yeshua is that his message was so little heeded. If he was Messiah, or even a true prophet, why didn’t he bring about the renewal of Israel? Why wasn’t the earth redeemed? Why didn’t the world to come start in his day? Where is the messianic redemption with all the promises of every person under their vine and fig tree?

Parables, according to the early rabbis in the land of Israel, were especially founded in Israel as a way of teaching by Solomon (see Song of Songs Rabbah, first chapter). They interpreted Mishlei (Proverbs) and Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) as illustrations of Torah truths. They saw Shir HaShirim (Song of Songs/Solomon) as figures of God’s dealings with Israel at the Exodus and Sinai. The figure or simile or parable (mashal) explains something about a scripture text.

The Sower parable is about good news that is bad news. It explains first and foremost how a true prophet (Isaiah, Yeshua) can speak what is good and yet he will not be heard. It explains how a generation can be so close to devastation (Isaiah’s in the Assyrian and Babylonian crises and Yeshua’s in the coming war with Rome) even though the kingdom is proclaimed. It explains how disciple circles can form and preserve the teaching for the future.

Isaiah’s words did not prevent Israel and Judah from collapsing, nor did Yeshua’s. But Isaiah’s words and Yeshua’s words did lead to the formation of disciple circles. They were passed down generation to generation.

The Sower parable is rich. To begin to understand it, realize it is a commentary on Isaiah 6. Realize first that it is about our human tendency not to receive the message. It is not our responsibility to bring the messianic era. The king will bring the kingdom. But he who has ears to hear will understand why it is delayed. We bear fruit while we wait.

If you would like to follow this series, here is Part 1.

To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables.
-Mark 4:11

“Kingdom” is not “afterlife” exactly and it is not “people of Israel” or “people of the Church.” The modern reader tends to inject meanings into Yeshua’s words that are not there. Looking in the words of Messiah for a message on how to qualify for a good afterlife, it is natural for many to see in the word “kingdom” a code word for “going to heaven.” This is a problem compounded by the fact that Matthew, the best-known gospel for many Bible readers, uses the phrase “kingdom of heaven” instead of “kingdom of God.” But, as many will rightly point out, “heaven” here stands for “God.” It is a euphemism, like saying “in the eyes of heaven.”

Another temptation is to see “kingdom” as either “the nation of people known as Israel” or “the visible institution of the church.” Christian pastors sometimes ask people to “work for the kingdom” with the understanding that “church is the kingdom.” In Judaism, “kingship of God” is a more common notion than “kingdom.” This is because Judaism, like Yeshua, is immersed in the Hebrew Bible.

What does Messiah mean when he says “to you” (the inner circle, those who come to me after my teaching and ask questions) is given the “secret of the kingdom” but to everyone else (outsiders who sit on the hills and listen from afar, hoping to catch a glimpse of a miracle) there are only “parables”?

Does he mean that the parables are not about the kingdom? Is the idea that the parables are teasers, mere hints, but that somewhere else we should look for Messiah’s real teaching? If so, where do we find this teaching?

No, it is not that there are two sets of teaching exactly, although the inner circle does get more explanation and teaching than the hill-sitters get. But rather, it is the whole package. Those who become part of Messiah’s disciple circle (not just the Twelve, but at least one hundred and twenty by the time of Acts 1) receive the secret. And the secret is not just one thing. It is many things.

Those who were in Messiah’s disciple circle, the ones who were fortunate enough to be there in Galilee and Judea so long ago, saw the actions of Messiah, got private explanations, and went through the experience of disappointment, terror, disbelief, startling realization, overwhelming joy, and sense of empowerment through the trial, death, burial, resurrection, commission, and ascension of Yeshua. The secret was being in the disciple circle. It was asking questions. It was watching Messiah do messianic things. It was seeing the kingdom in action. It was living through the greatest misunderstanding about kingdom (that death and suffering lead to the reign of God).

It is possible to be in Messiah’s disciple circle now. The requirement is a willingness to consider his words and actions. The requirement is to do this with others. The requirement is to believe.

In this series, I will explore a little at a time the details of Messiah’s parables and what they mean about the kingdom, future and present. What is the kingdom exactly? What does a first century Jewish teacher mean when he says “kingdom of God”? How do we apply this?

These are symbolic actions, a kind of prophetic message in and of themselves. Yeshua also engaged in symbolic actions and what I call kingdom enactments.

Symbolic Actions Declaring High Authority

• The Triumphal Entry (Mk 11:1-11; Mt 21:1-11; Lk 19:29-44; Jn 12:12-19) – Riding deliberately into the city as per Zechariah 9 with crowds hailing him, Yeshua is making a claim of messianic identity.
• The Temple Cleansing (Mk 11:15-17; Mt 21:12-13; Lk 19:45-46; Jn 2:13-17) – Perhaps Malachi 3:1 is in the background (after the messenger — Elijah, John the Baptist) the Lord comes suddenly to his Temple. Yeshua quotes Isaiah 56 and Jeremiah 7. This action largely contributed to his arrest and execution.
• Forgiving Sins (Mk 2:5; Mt 9:2; Lk 5:20 and another incident in Lk 7:48) – In even the most skeptical interpretation, Yeshua is claiming to know when God forgives a sinner. Since he says in Mk 2:10; Mt 9:6; Lk 5:24 that the Son of Man has authority to forgive, evidence is strong Yeshua is claiming more. He is claiming to be the divine Son of Man with authority in such matters as per Daniel 7 and the dominion given him by the Ancient of Days.
• Sending the Twelve (Mk 6:7-13; Mt 10:5-42; Lk 9:1-6) and Sending the Seventy (Lk 10:1-16) – Even more so that Yeshua’s own mission of proclaiming the kingdom (Mk 1:15; Mt 4:17), sending disciples to proclaim it suggests starting a renewal movement (a prophetic or even messianic role).

Symbolic Actions as Identity Stories

• The Baptism of Yeshua (Mk 1:9-11; Mt 3:13-17; Lk 3:21-22) – Yeshua’s participation in John’s movement already connects him to the role of prophet. The heavenly voice affirms Yeshua’s identity.
• The Temptation of Yeshua (Mk 1:12-13; Mt 4:1-11; Lk 4:1-13) – Yeshua is tested for worthiness for a role of high authority (prophet, messiah). Satan affirms Yeshua’s identity in an ironic manner.
• The Transfiguration (Mk 9:2-10; Mt 17:1-9; Lk 9:28-36) – Yeshua ascends a mountain with three as witnesses and experiences a prefiguring of coming glory and a visit from Moses and Elijah. A heavenly voice affirms his identity.

Kingdom Enactments
In these Yeshua demonstrates that he has partially brought the kingdom with him (the rest to come later).

• Healings, for in the world to come there will be no illness, disability, or death.
• Exorcisms, for the forces of spiritual evil are due to be defeated by God.
• Banquets, which foreshadow the banquet to come, a messianic promise.

• The Man in the Capernaum Synagogue, Mark 1:23-27 (Lk 4:33-36).
• The Gerasene Demoniac, Mark 5:1-20 (Mt 8:28-34; Lk 8:26-39).
• The Syro-Phoenician Woman’s Daughter, Mark 7:25-30 (Mt 15:21-28).
• The Deaf and Mute Spirit, Mark 9:14-29 (Mt 17:14-20; Lk 9:37-43).
• The Blind and Mute Man, Matthew 12:22-24.
• The Bent Woman, Luke 13:10-16.

Yet, before we would jump to Paul’s explanation of Abraham (Rom 4:3; Gal 3:7), it is good to consider a step earlier than the realization that Abraham represents faith. It is eye-opening to re-read some of the Abraham texts in the gospels with an eye for first century Jewish ideas about election, covenant, and afterlife. Let’s begin with three texts:

Bear fruit that befits repentance, and do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. (Matt 3:8-10; cf. Luke 3:8-10).

When Yeshua heard him, he marveled, and said to those who followed him, “Truly, I say to you, not even in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and sit at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness; there men will weep and gnash their teeth.” And to the centurion Yeshua said, “Go; be it done for you as you have believed.” (Matt 8:10-13).

The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s bosom. The rich man also died and was buried; and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes, and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus in his bosom. And he called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy upon me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in anguish in this flame.’ But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish. And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.’ (Luke 16:22-26).

In all three of these texts, Abraham represents Israel’s election as the Chosen People and the idea, current in Yeshua’s time, that being born a child of Abraham put a person in a privileged position with God.

Modern scholars, following E.P. Sanders, have called this belief covenantal nomism. Nomism refers to the Greek word for Law (nomos) and it is the idea that every Israelite, already being in covenant with God and privileged with inclusion in the afterlife already, would keep at least enough Torah (nomos) to remain Jewish. Sanders rightly dismissed the idea that first century Jews were like the Pelagians that Augustine fought or the medieval churchmen that Luther fought. They were not by the merit of their deeds thinking they gained position with God.

Yeshua’s problem (and John the Baptist’s problem) with the idea of Abrahamic privilege is much the same as Yeshua’s problem with what Temple and Torah had become. Yeshua did not reject Temple, Torah, or the Abrahamic promise. In every case, he rejected the false sense of privilege and entitlement that people felt as “the Chosen.”

John said to his audience at the Jordan that their rightness with God depended on repentance and living according to justice as in the Torah and prophets. Yeshua said that “sons of the kingdom” would be excluded from Abraham’s table in the messianic age while many gentiles from “east and west” would be included, because of faith. In the Lazarus and the Rich Man parable, both are Israelites and standard thinking would be that both would be at Abraham’s bosom (a reference to reclining at a table next to Abraham). Yet Yeshua says the rich man will be excluded because he ignored day after day the beggar at his gates, proving his hard heart was not for God.

Nearly every use of “Abraham” in the gospels, including John, is a reference to this notion of carnal election, privilege by birth, and is a vehicle for Yeshua to say, “Election in Abraham is not an invitation to the banquet to come, but a calling to be like Abraham in making this world like the one to come.”

See also a treatment of more Abraham texts in “Abraham in the Gospels.”

Yeshua is the Moses-like Prophet-to-Come, the New Moses, whose agency as the Voice of the Father reveals depths of God unknown or ambiguous in previous revelation.

I listed for readers the findings of Paul Anderson regarding the prophet-like-Moses theme in the fourth gospel, which is not a minor motif but a guiding principle of the entire Gospel of John (see my post “Moses-Like-Prophet in John” here).

In searching out examples of how Yeshua revealed greater depths of God than had previously been known, I first went down a path seeking in the teaching of Yeshua new revelation. I think to some degree I was on the wrong path. I came up with a list of nine existential questions about God and us that are addressed in Yeshua’s teaching and wrote a blog post about it (see “The Son Has Spoken” here).

Yet as I taught this material at our synagogue, a perceptive woman and friend said, “But, Derek, none of that is new. That’s all good interpretation of what’s already in the Hebrew Bible.”

I quickly realized she was right. In terms of Yeshua’s teaching about God’s nature, nearly all of it is accessible in the Hebrew Bible if you avoid certain pitfalls. Judaism has, like Christianity, fallen into a number of pitfalls in this area (e.g., the Saadian and Maimonidean ideas about God’s unity and transcendence in utter denial of real Presence).

Not long after realizing that I was searching in the wrong place — looking for Yeshua’s new revelation of the depths of God in his teaching — I came across some good thoughts on the New Moses theme in Matthew in a book by Darrell Bock (Jesus According to Scripture). His comments on Matthew 13:16-17, 52, made me realize that Yeshua’s purpose in teaching was often to clarify what was already in the old. The new wine was mostly new because the shepherds of Israel did not, in Yeshua’s time, understand the message of the prophets.

Those prophets, according to Matthew 13:16-17, desired to look into Yeshua’s time, to see in his identity and teaching the completion of what they envisioned. And the good scribe of the kingdom (the scribe who knows the King, Yeshua, and looks for his kingdom to come) brings forth both new and old. That is, the old (Hebrew Bible) is inextricably connected with the new, and the scribe brings forth the connections (but most writing about “messianic prophecy” has been terrible and has not followed scribal patterns at all).

Where I needed to be looking, to find the new revelation of the Sent-One, was not in Yeshua’s public teaching, per se. I needed to be looking more at his deeds (somewhat in combination with his teaching). It is more in the deeds and hints at the identity of Yeshua that we find the new things coming forth from the old.

I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children.
Matthew 11:25 (and Luke 10:21).

What are some of the things revealed to little children that may be referenced here?

The following list is subject to more evidence that I am planning to give here. I am not pretending that in listing these points I have demonstrated my case for them. This is an initial presentation of some themes and ideas presented in the gospels that cry out for closer scrutiny. Also, it is important to me not to simply draw from the fourth gospel, where the exalted identity of Yeshua is especially emphasized. Any meaningful portrait of what is new in Yeshua ought to draw from the synoptics as well as John.

• The Way of Surrender. I was struck by a phrase in an essay by Marianne Meye Thompson: the path that God designates . . . giving power up in surrender of one’s life and service to others (“Jesus and His God” in The Cambridge Companion to Jesus, 2001). Yeshua not only described his own messianic career as being about surrender of his life and service, but said repeatedly that disciples were to lose their life, that the last was greatest, and that his followers should be servants to all. This is not simply social justice (the message of the Israelite prophets). It is a radical step beyond. It is Messiah killed being the real glory of Messiah. It is kingdom subjects not only working for justice, but selling everything for a pearl of great value. This is not an incidental theme, but is central in all four gospels (the messianic secret, the Sermon on the Mount, the kingdom for the poor, the lifted up Son of Man, and many other themes).
• Ransom theology. This is an outgrowth of the first point. In surrendering all, Yeshua accomplishes a ransom. The famous ransom passage (Mk 10:45; Mt 20:28) is greeted with skepticism by many scholars (a late addition? it sounds too churchy, say some). Ransom theology goes beyond the way of surrender theme. Not only does Yeshua give up power in service to others, but his surrender to death, but this act of sacrifice is a necessary transaction for people to have life. This is cross theology. It grows out of the Exodus-Passover story.
• Faith as inclusion in the kingdom. I do not think Yeshua in any way denies the election of Israel, which is a carnal election (via birth, not faith). I think, rather, he introduces a concept of a second requirement beyond election. The renewal movement of Yeshua suggests it is not enough to be Israel. God has not yet sent the messianic age because Israel has to go beyond being the Elect. Israel must believe and act according to belief. And in making belief the requirement for renewal, Yeshua opens the door for those in the Nations as well. This is where Yeshua’s universalism (that the divine covenant promises cover the whole world and not only Israel) comes through the door. Paul’s “works of the Law” equal presumption of rightness with God via birth as Jews (or conversion). Paul’s “salvation by faith” equals Yeshua’s call to “believe in me.” This is where Matthew 13:16-17 is really explained: the prophets called for faith and action, but the object of that faith and action was waiting to be seen. Yeshua claims to be that object of faith. And the action required is belief in his identity and message. The irrevocable election of Israel remains important, for in the fulness of time, Israel will also come to the renewal of faith, as the prophets had already foretold. And now that Yeshua has come, that faith can only be in the Messiah himself.
• Word made flesh (incarnation). It is not only John, as some think, but all through the gospels, that we see Yeshua as the Exalted One, whose identity is more than a man. It is a mystery, because the nature of God as both transcendent (the Eternal, the Beyond-Knowing) and immanent (the Word-Glory-Presence) is mysterious. Yeshua is more than the Prophet-like-Moses, ultimately, but is the Prophetic-word incarnate. He is Living Torah. All things have been handed over to Yeshua by the Father. Even the wind and waves obey him. He comes in the Glory of his Father. He is greater than the Temple. He is before Abraham. Unless we know that he is, we will die in our sins.

Yeshua heals and those with faith are made well. Yeshua defeats evil powers and demons are drawn to oppose him, but they can only obey his greater authority. Yeshua criticizes the shepherds of Israel who have followed the pattern of domination and not surrender. Yeshua gathers disciples for his way of surrender. And Yeshua surrenders to the difficult will of the Father (“he will speak to them all that I command him,” “the word which you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me”). And all these things are revealed not to the wise, the shepherds of Israel who deal in power, but to little children.

I thought it appropriate to repost the blog here on Yeshua in Context because it deals with practical matters of discipleship. Studying the gospels and the life of Yeshua should not be merely about history or theory. As John 7:17 indicates, Yeshua expected that doing his kingdom teaching was the way to know it is true. After the jump you will find the full text of “The Way to Have a Message.”

The discussion this week is about MJ having an intelligent message for promoting Yeshua-faith. It is about the cause of representing hope and faith in the Jewish community and showing that there is a better way to live and know God and love people. And I do believe that in every way, in every form of Jewish expression, Yeshua is needed. There isn’t any aspect of Judaism that isn’t taken to greater heights by the realization of who Yeshua is and knowing his kingdom teaching.

But there is a very good reason why MJ doesn’t do well at representing Yeshua to the Jewish community (a reason I will share after the jump).

Meanwhile, we’ve had lots of great discussion. I want to point out in particular a comment by Rabbi Joshua Brumbach (which I will respond to):

I think we are first and foremost to be a representative presence of Yeshua within the Jewish community. We are a community of faith and our promoting Yeshua-faith to the wider Jewish community should come as a natural outgrowth of that. It is secondary (yet still imperative) to our existence as a holy remnant within, and as a part of, greater Israel.

I also want to point out a comment by Bob Williams:

I think many of us in MJ circles would like to see much more of a “Relationship Evangelism” aka “Lifestyle Evangelism” but too many of our people are not in relationships of any sort with Jewish non-Yeshua-believers. Its hard to influence those you never interact with in any meaningful way. (Perhaps an even bigger problem here is that for “Relationship Evangelism” to work, there must be evidence of transformation in the lives of our people. Sometimes when I look around I wonder what’s supposed to be so attractive here.)

Great thoughts. Now let’s talk about how to have a message.

The reason MJ doesn’t do well at representing Yeshua is simple. It was in yesterday’s gospel reading (John 7:14-36):

. . . if any man is willing to do his will, he shall know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority.
-John 7:17

We don’t represent Yeshua well because we don’t emphasize living the kingdom as Yeshua taught it.

SUBSTITUTE #1: Weekly meetings and lively musical worship. This is all good, but it’s not the main point.
SUBSTITUTE #2: Torah study / Bible reading / online study for inspiration and social interaction / reading books. This is input. Where is the output?
SUBSTITUTE #3: Feeling like we are right and others are wrong, as if being “right” is what the kingdom is about.

When will our Jewish people know the words of Yeshua are true?

You know the answer if you been engaging in “Substitute #2.” It will happen when we get caught doing the will of the Father.

KINGDOM LIVING #1: Have weekly meetings where people are empowered to form community, to live on a higher plane of love and deeds of kindness, and to make a difference so that our goal is to make this world more like the world to come.
KINGDOM LIVING #2: Read the Torah, the gospels and Acts (in particular, but the whole Bible as well) in order to do what it says and the doing is more important than the learning.
KINGDOM LIVING #3: Be busy doing right and don’t worry about being right.

When we are more know for what we do than what we believe, we will have a message.

So, in part, then, I agree with Rabbi Joshua’s statement cited above. And I agree with Bob Williams’ statement. We need to get busy being the holy remnant. We need to ask, as Bob Williams is asking, “I wonder what’s supposed to be so attractive here.”

Just so no one thinks I am still only being theoretical, let me mention a huge list of things that doing the kingdom includes. The point of this list is not to limit what doing the kingdom means, but to give some practical guidelines and pointers. Your applications of Yeshua’s kingdom teachings will no doubt grow over the years as you study Torah and gospel:
Live in forgiving community — work for Tikkun Olam — feed hungry people and clothe naked people — be a person in the workplace who helps people with problems — use possessions to help people — know and be able to explain the world to come — care for children — be strong in marital and family love — give tzedaka (alms) — pray with a vision to work that the prayers would come true — develop Middot (the measures of Torah character) — heal relationships — visit lonely or needy people — share hospitality deliberately and often — help people harmed by injustice — confess wrongs — teach children — volunteer — give up control — serve in every situation and do not look to be served — pay off debts so you’ll have more to give — live simply and joyfully — support others in community with cooperation and participation — be of high integrity in your work and social interactions — and any other applications which come out of your regular reading and prayer.

REFERENCE:
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, To Heal a Fractured World: The Ethics of Responsibility (2005, Schocken).
Scot McKnight, One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Follow (2010, Zondervan).
Abraham Joshua Heschel, The Prophets (1962, reprinted in 2007 by Hendrickson).
http://www.messianicjudaism.me/musings/2011/05/10/life-of-loving-deeds-1/ (and more will follow in this series).

Kingdom Winners
A comment in Scot McKnight’s book One.Life got me thinking. He made a comparison between two two-part parables of Yeshua that I had never thought of connecting before.

The first two-part parable occurs only in Luke 14 and concerns the builder of a tower and a king counting his troops. The second two-part parable occurs only in Matthew 13 and concerns one who finds a treasure in a field and another who finds a “pearl of great price.” There’s no literary connection between them, but there is a thematic connection.

One is about kingdom winners. The other is about kingdom losers.

To begin to understand the concept of kingdom from a practical point of view, I’d like to read a few excerpts from McKnight’s book. This is not about the theology of the kingdom or tracing the biblical roots of God’s kingship. Those are very important tasks on their own. But this is about what the kingdom means in a sense of practice, of living in light of the Rule of God on earth:

Every Jew in Galilee and everywhere else, and I mean every one of them, when they heard Jesus say “the kingdom,” looked for three things: king, land, citizens. This might surprise you, but that is only because so many Christians have turned kingdom into either a “personal experience with Jesus” (the evangelical meaning of kingdom) or into “cultural redemption” (the liberal, progressive meaning of kingdom). When Jesus said “the kingdom,” the first thing his hearers looked for was a king, and then they were thinking of a land (or a sacred place or sacred space) and themselves as participants (citizens). This needs to be fleshed out for one reason: Kingdom is not about an experience with God but about the society of God, and this society is Jewish (and biblical) to the core.
-McKnight, 30.

It’s a great explanation and I appreciate the emphasis on Jesus in his Jewish context. I appreciate McKnight’s refusal to reduce the kingdom to a feeling or an individualistic experience. I also appreciate his refusal to reduce the kingdom to a feel-good message about improving humanity.

God’s society has a king, a land, a specific and definite shape and purpose and destination. The king is God himself who has given all authority to the Son. The land is Israel but the kingdom spreads to the whole renewed earth from Israel. The specific plan and shape unfolds in stages and we are in part of it now and much more is to come. God’s society is initiated and much work has been done by God and his servants, but, to say it simply, we ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

And then, on page 31, McKnight gives a very practical definition of kingdom: God’s Dream Society on earth, spreading out from the land of Israel to encompass the whole world.

On page 82, he summarizes some of the key practices involved in living for the kingdom, saying that a disciple is one who follows Jesus by devoting his or her One.Life to the kingdom of God, fired by Jesus’ own imagination, to a life of loving God and loving others, and to a society shaped by justice, especially for those who have been marginalized, and to peace.

The kingdom and living for the kingdom, then, is a big deal. And there are winners and losers. And what makes the difference between them?

Let’s consider the contrast between the two sets of parables that first turned my mind to the subject. Let’s consider the tower builder and king counting his troops versus the treasure finder and pearl seeker.

The Difference Between Winning and Losing the Kingdom
The tower builder and the king counting his troops stories both come in a section of Luke concerned with instruction for disciples about what to expect and how to follow the Master.

Yeshua’s demands are high. Given a choice between family and the work of a disciple, Yeshua says sharply that being a disciple is far greater in priority. Given a choice between protecting our lives and clinging to safety versus doing the hard work of a disciples, Yeshua says there is really no choice. A disciple will go to the cross for faith and love. A disciple will not count death too great a price.

For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, ‘This man began to build, and was not able to finish.’

I thought I used to understand this parable. The first time I read it, I had the wrong idea. I thought this was a calling for a special category of person, something not addressed to everyone hearing Yeshua’s words. I thought these words were for people who wanted to become clergy, to be missionaries or pastors or monks or holy men and women of some kind. So I thought this could mean, “Don’t take up the calling to be an especially holy person unless you think you can handle the challenge.”

I felt as if most people would be free to ignore this demand of Yeshua. There could be ordinary followers and specially dedicated followers, I reasoned, and the cost of being dedicated is too high for most people.

The second story in this two-part parable is similar: Or what king, going to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and take counsel whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends an embassy and asks terms of peace.

Don’t start building a tower unless you have the means to finish. Be careful before you accept the challenge to war. Is the tower worth it? Is the reward of winning worth it?

Then Yeshua gives the lesson of the parable: So therefore, whoever of you does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.

Here is the truly important thing: Yeshua tells us specifically what the cost is — renouncing our possessions.

Contrast that with the two-part parable in Matthew 13: The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.

Note here that the lesson is the same, though made positively instead of negatively: sell everything and commit yourself one hundred percent to the kingdom.

The difference between kingdom winners and losers is simple: commitment.

One hundred percent commitment makes you a disciple. Ninety-nine percent commitment leaves you with a crumbling, unfinished tower; leaves you not in possession of the pearl or the treasure; leaves you conquered and defeated by the other kingdom, the kingdom that had higher commitment than you did.

Okay, yes, Yeshua deliberately exaggerates. Yes, in his mercy God accepts all efforts made in his direction and humility goes a long way.

But you can’t get around this: the kingdom is about knowing the king, believing in his land, being a participant in his dream society, and committing all your possessions to the cause.

Specific ways that gets fleshed out, ways that draw on Jewish and Christian thought about the ethics of responsibility, about almsgiving and tzedaka, about serving and sacrifice, that’s what we need to think about and put into practice.

Because if there is one thing that costs more than the kingdom, it is missing the kingdom.

What I mean is this: in Mark’s gospel, we see the theme of the identity of the veiled Son of Man. He is much more than he appears to be. Those who remain close to him see this gradually more and more. The coming Son of Man (Yeshua in his Second Coming) will bring all of that future hope to reality. So Mark is apocalyptic (interested in showing how the Eternal breaks through into the Present).

In Luke’s gospel, the reality of a disciple-community spread throughout the empire dealing with the problems of an absent Lord and an unbelieving Roman populace, is more obviously in the background. So Luke emphasizes the present need for faith and the Spirit. While we wait, we are in distress and our gospel seems impossible to believe.

This difference (not contradiction) in emphasis was clarified for me this morning as I considered how Luke follows up the Sower parable with a series of illuminating stories.

In presenting this outline, I am saying that Luke has taken the same stories from Mark’s gospel, and ordered them in a way that emphasizes the present situation of disciples: in need of faith and the Spirit while the current crisis of Yeshua’s absence is going on. If you are not used to the idea that a storyteller shapes a message in the order and details of the story, please let me be clear: I am not saying that Luke has distorted the stories or that his version contradicts Mark’s or Matthew’s.

SOWER PARABLE – Luke 8:4-15
As I have said in Yeshua in Context chapter 11 and in other commentary on the Sower parable, the issue of the whole parable is the word Yeshua is spreading about the kingdom’s arrival and the way the delay of the kingdom causes people to fall away, except for disciples who bear fruit like Yeshua.

THE LAMP ON A STAND – Luke 8:16-18
Yeshua is the lamp who will be put up on a stand (you know, the cross). Much will be revealed when the kingdom does not come as expected but when the hoped for king dies instead. Blessed is the disciple who grasps the truth. God will give much to those who have faith.

YESHUA’S TRUE FAMILY – Luke 8:19-21
Those who are scandalized by Yeshua are not his true family. But those who believe even in crisis will hear and do what the word teaches. The word means the specific word Yeshua is teaching about the kingdom (that he will bring it and while waiting, his disciples are to bear the fruit of the kingdom–healing, serving, redeeming).

STILLING THE STORM – Luke 8:22-25
In a crisis, Yeshua asks, “Where is your faith?” Luke is asking the disciples in his generation the same question: the Second Coming is delayed and our message seems to be in crisis, but in this situation, do we have faith to keep going?

THE GERASENE DEMONIAC – Luke 8:26-39
The story is a parallel to the Yeshua story. The demoniac is virtually a dead man who returns to life. His story is spreading in a gentile region. The people of the region are distrustful of the message and want nothing to do with Yeshua. The man tells his death-to-life story all over the gentile region. Isn’t Luke mirroring what is happening in his time? The basis of the faith the Yeshua-community is spreading is a story about a man who passed from death to life. And the eyewitness accounts that informed the gospel are the only reason the disciples can give a resistant people to believe.

TWO HEALINGS: THE BLEEDING WOMAN AND JAIRUS’ DAUGHTER – Luke 8:40-56
Yeshua says to the woman, “Your faith has saved you.” He says to those who doubt he can raise Jairus’ daughter, “Do not fear; only believe.”

This whole section is stories reflecting on the meaning of the Sower parable. The word has been planted, Yeshua’s word that the exile is over and the kingdom is arriving, but is also delayed. The kingdom is present and future. Its present aspect is faith and fruit. Its future aspect is the Second Coming and the time of God’s direct reign. Luke’s way of presenting it all emphasizes what we, in this present distress, are to do: believe and teach. Our strength is in the witness of the past (Yeshua rose) and reminding ourselves of this belief is what will get us through this long crisis.

Cliches like splitting hairs, chopping logic, quibbling over details, or making fine distinctions come to mind as the probable result of insisting on a good interpretation of a few words from an ancient saying. After all, do the differences really amount to much?

Well, I think they do. Take the phrase “poor in spirit” for example.

I was explaining the Beatitudes at a “Yeshua in Context” seminar this past weekend. It was the third lecture in a few hours and the whole experience for me was like an intensive meditation on the meaning of being a disciple, of being a follower, of thinking about what it meant to be near to Messiah and learn from him. I was learning at least as much as those I was speaking to. Sometimes inspired texts do that.

Of course, following the example of Yeshua, I started the talk with something unexpected. Predictability is often not the best tactic in teaching. So we started by thinking about the Beatitudes in Luke 6 instead of the more familiar ones in Matthew 5.

Matthew’s version is easier to take, especially Matthew’s version of the very first Beatitude about the “poor in spirit.” As you probably know, in Luke’s version, Yeshua makes a very similar point, but not about the “poor in spirit,” but rather “the poor.” Blessed are the poor.

Why is “poor in spirit” easier to take?

It’s because there is no alternate way to understand “blessed are the poor.” “Blessed are the poor” is an antithesis, pure and simple. It’s truth standing on its head, logic upside down. It’s crazy to say “blessed are the poor.”

But “poor in spirit” is capable of a few comfortable interpretations. The common one goes like this: “Blessed are people who exhibit humility, who think more of others than themselves. They are poor in spirit but rich in rewards from God.”

It’s a nice interpretation and the main point of it is certainly true. So if we just read Matthew’s version of the saying that way, we can’t go wrong. Right?

Why not just read all of Matthew’s Beatitudes in a parallel manner? Meek people are humble. Those who hunger and thirst in Matthew do so for righteousness (of course, in Luke, they just hunger and thirst). Being merciful is good. Peacemakers and people will to be persecuted are good.

Maybe all the Beatitudes are about something we do to earn a blessing. God gives the kingdom to humble people, the poor in spirit, and the meek and merciful. Maybe that’s what Yeshua meant.

But I don’t think so.

I think there is plenty of evidence that the “poor in spirit” are the broken and devastated. And the meek are not the “saints of humility” but rather the stepped on and oppressed, the ones always overlooked and never assumed to be important.

I think there is a long tradition of this in the Psalms and Prophets (and also the Wisdom) before Yeshua ever comes to teach God’s way to a band of disciples.

Job exhibits repeatedly a Wisdom tradition concerning care for the poor as a sign of righteousness, such as in 30:25, “Did not I weep for him whose day was hard? Was not my soul grieved for the poor?”

In Psalms the poor or needy one is the special subject of God’s care, as in 34:7(6), “This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles.”

The Prophets rail against the injustice done to the poor, as in Isaiah 3:14, “What do you mean by crushing my people, by grinding the face of the poor?”

So, a good interpretation of the Beatitudes does matter and it gives a different message. It is not, “Blessed are the righteous for they will earn a reward.” It is, rather:

Blessed are the crushed people, devastated, for theirs is the kingdom.
Blessed are those suffering grief, for they will be comforted by God.
Blessed are the overlooked and oppressed, for these will own the world to come.
Blessed are those who cannot find justice and true goodness in this broken world, for they will see goodness in the kingdom.
Blessed are those who have mercy now, for all will see how mercy is needed then.
Blessed are those who work for the One Thing, for they will see the One.
Blessed are those who heal fights and bitterness, for this is what God does.
Blessed are those who suffer for the mission of healing and serving, for their reward will redeem the persecution.

And the underlying message is also clear: My disciples will work to make this world as much like the world to come as they can.

Kingdom at Hand?
What did Yeshua mean about the kingdom of God being at hand (soon to appear) in Mark 1:15? He followed this proclamation up by calling disciples, defeating evil spirits, and making people well. In the world to come there will be no evil, people will be well, and all will be as a family in union with each other and God. Yeshua was bringing future realities into the present. Note that many of Yeshua’s kingdom parables (Sower, Mustard Seed) represent present realities and not just future.

Sinners and Mustard Plants
Yeshua came to call sinners (Mark 2:17). The parable of the Mustard Seed is more about the plant than the seed (Mark 4:30-32). The mustard weeds are a gardener’s nightmare. They grow up all over and become nesting places for birds. One reading is that the birds that nest are undesirables, like sinners and gentiles. So the present kingdom grows up unstoppably and attracts those who might not seem like kingdom people.

Binding the Strongman
Yeshua announced his intention to enter the house of evil and plunder its goods, by first binding the strongman (Satan, see Mark 3:27). Some might read the “plunder his goods” in purely conversionary terms (converting lost people and saving them from Satan’s control), but everything in the gospels suggests Yeshua freed people from evil in more holistic ways (wellness, provision, and redemption).

Beatitudes
As I discuss in chapter 10 of Yeshua in Context, the Beatitudes (Matt 5:1-12; Luke 6:20-23) have both a present and future aspect. For example, Matthew 5:2 has a future part (“theirs is the kingdom of heaven”) and a present (“blessed are the poor in spirit”). It is more than implied that disciples hearing Yeshua’s sermon will bless the poor in spirit, comfort mourners, fill the hungry, and so on. Yeshua is calling us to live now in light of what will come in God’s kingdom.

As You Measure, Alms, Do Not Worry
It is the Father’s pleasure to give us the kingdom, says Yeshua (Luke 12:32). So we do not need the treasures of this world. But instead we should sell things and give alms (12:33). This principle is stated without balance, causing many to disregard it completely. It is not an absolute principle. Possessing things is clearly not wrong (a case I can easily demonstrate if challenged). But the balance of owning versus sharing is way off in the lives of nearly all people who have the opportunity to own many things. Treasure in heaven (not in the sky or in the future, but treasure in the heavenly court–as in reward from the one who sits on the heavenly throne) is stored up for the righteous. And Messiah tells us: “Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For the measure you give will be the measure you get back” (Luke 6:38). So we are not to worry about our life, our food, our clothing (Luke 12:22). The Father knows we need these things. And Matthew records it this way, “When you give alms…” (6:2).

When You Fed These
There are sheep and there are goats, the blessed and the judged. Those blessed fed the least and in so doing fed Yeshua. Those judged, as Keith Green says in his famous song on the Sheep and Goats, were too busy running religious organizations to help (not that I am innocent of this myself). See Matthew 25:31-46.

The Temple State
Yeshua’s protest against the Temple (Mark 11:15-19) was about commerce in the holy precincts, about the violation of the sacred by carrying things through God’s courts, about hypocrisy in the leadership, and a protest against a Temple state that demanded obedience from the masses but which did not obey in turn. Had the Temple state followed Torah as it demanded of the people, the tithes would have been redistributed and the people blessed with abundance. See “Yeshua and the Mishnah on Carrying in the Temple” and “Yeshua and Idolatrous Coins.” Mark 11 contrasts the Yeshua-community with its faith and prayer with the Temple state (see below, “The Disciple Communities as Alternative”).

The Disciple Communities as Insiders
To you (plural, disciples) has been given the secret of the kingdom of God (Mark 4:11). To those outside, all looks like a riddle. But they will know you are my disciples by your love (John 13:35).

The Disciple Communities as Alternative
These are my mother and brothers, said Yeshua (Mark 4:34), those who do the will of God (4:35). The powers of death (some say “gates of hell”) will not be able to stand before this community (Matt 16:18). In Mark 11, Yeshua curses a fig tree right before he protests the Temple state. Afterward, he uses the fig tree as a lesson. His disciple movement will be about prayer that moves mountains and forgiving one another as their Father in heaven forgives their sins. What the Temple state cannot accomplish (bringing the world to come through righteousness), Yeshua’s disciples community will do. For more on this, see “Discipleship and the Fig Tree.”

After the commentary, I will suggest a few points of application for discipleship in our time.

MARK 11:12-14, 20-25
Yeshua curses a fig tree (vss. 12-14).
In between is Yeshua’s Temple protest action (vss. 15-19).
The next morning’s lesson from the fig tree (vss. 20-25).

This whole section in vss. 14-25 is a classic example of what some have called the Markan sandwich technique. He begins to tell a story, follows with another scene which may not seem to be related, and then returns to the story. So, here, Yeshua curses a fig tree and then the story of his Temple protest action is related. But the next morning, the story comes back to the fig tree.

The episode raises a number of questions. Is Yeshua’s cursing a fig tree rational or irrational? Does the fig tree symbolize something specific and should we try to find the exact reference? Which mountain does Yeshua have in mind for being moved by prayer? How does the fig tree lesson relate to the Temple protest action?

To begin, we need to understand the seasons for figs in Israel. By Passover (April) there would usually be leaves, but no figs. By Shavuot (June), the same time as the wheat harvest, would be the early crop of figs (there are two fig crops a year in Israel’s climate). Therefore, and as Mark is careful to point out, it is irrational for Yeshua to expect figs at Passover. This means his action with the fig tree is purely symbolic. His curious action, a prophetic enactment, is meant to make the disciples curious.

The next morning, after the Temple protest action, Peter remembers the fig tree as they pass it, now brown and withered. Does Yeshua now launch into a lesson about Israel being fruitless and unworthy, as we might expect? Not at all. He launches into a lesson about the power of prayer. What could it all mean?

First, it is helpful to know that the fig comes up as a symbol in the prophets several times for Israel’s faith and fruitfulness. Micah speaks of God’s disappointment at finding no fig to eat in Israel (7:1). Hosea describes Israel as a withered fig tree without fruit (9:10). Yet the promise of a great age of peace is that every man will sit under his vine and fig tree (Isa 36:16; Mic 4:4).

Second, we should forget about some specific symbolic meaning, since Yeshua gives no such clues. Neither should we read the mountain of vs. 23 with some specific reference (as if this is about the Mount of Olives and the Zechariah 14 imagery, as some interpreters do). Yeshua does not take the lesson in this direction. Note that Yeshua’s words about faith moving a mountain come up again in Paul in 1 Cor 13:2 (“faith so as to move mountains”).

What we have here is a potent contrast between the powerful Temple state and the humble disciple group. The Temple, though holy, has become corrupt through its leadership. It is a religious institution of vast wealth and power. But it is not effective at making Israel holy and fruitful. So, Yeshua, powerless and alone, makes an ineffective protest action, an irrational act which cannot succeed (like his irrational expectation of a fig tree to have early fruit). But while Yeshua’s protest does not bring the Temple to its knees, his curse does wither a fig tree.

This leads to a lesson about prayer. The humble disciple group has more power than all the Temple state. If they do God’s will and pray, nothing is beyond their ability. God will move mountains, shake empires, and change the world through them. Their power is not in wealth or position, but in prayer, forgiveness, and faith.

DISCIPLESHIP LESSONS:
… The power of the Yeshua community is never going to be in money, position, and power over people to govern or coerce.
… The power of the Yeshua community comes from God and is based on faith and prayer.
… We should not read that we have the power to move mountains, but that God does. Thus we have no “blank check” from God here, but rather the promise that as we serve him he will move mountains and use us along the way.
… The Temple state and its leaders made the error of setting goals based on personal power and trying to make them come to pass.
… Yeshua, who has real power, does not use it to coerce. He could have smitten the Temple completely, but instead made a protest action which changed nothing. He stands for right even if his actions do not overthrow evil. So the Yeshua community stands for right even though we cannot change evil.
… Unlike the Temple state Yeshua protested, our calling as a disciple community is to understand and discern God’s purposes in healing people and the world and to stand praying for mountains to move as God wills. Our power is in togetherness, faith, and prayer centered on our wise understanding of God’s purposes, not agendas created to manipulate the process or establish power structures.
… The Jewish tradition of prayer with additional prayers and teachings by Yeshua is a good tradition which accomplishes these purposes for the disciple community as Yeshua taught us (note that Mark 11:25 is the closest Mark comes to echoing Yeshua’s prayer recorded in Matthew and Luke).

But it is impossible to exaggerate the importance of the idea that Yeshua was a prophet of the kingdom from within the story, from within the experience the disciples and crowds had of Yeshua. For them Yeshua was a potential prophet, a healer, an exorcist. How does Yeshua come across as a prophet in Mark? What sorts of things do we learn from this?

Rather than go through a boring list of passages in which Yeshua plays a prophet role, I thought I’d look more deeply into one story and reflect on the others from within it.

The classical story is, of course, Mark 8:27-38. The disciples’ answer to Yeshua’s question is, “John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others one of the prophets.” Only one disciple goes further, Peter, and we wonder if all of the Twelve would have gotten this or if Peter had better insight than the others. (Yes, I know that in another gospel, John, we have Andrew telling Peter, “We have found the Messiah” (1:41)).

The popular notions of Yeshua’s identity all had to do with the role of prophet. John the Baptist and Elijah, of course, were prophets. If Yeshua wasn’t one of them returned to life, then who was he? He must be one of the other prophets (Malachi? Isaiah? It’s hard to know who else people might have imagined).

It’s curious that in Mark’s wording, it did not occur to anyone that he was simply “Yeshua the prophet,” but that he was “Yeshua with the spirit of one of the prophets upon him.” That is, we might wonder if people resisted the idea of a new prophet and thought that God might bring back one of the hallowed prophets in a kind of spiritual endowment on a contemporary person.

And what sort of prophet was Yeshua. What “prophetic” topics did he address? Leaving aside for the moment his healings and feedings, which put him in an Elijah-Elisha category, we would have to say that Yeshua was a prophet of the kingdom.

The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel (Mark 1:15).

I will make you fishers of men (1:17) said Yeshua, meaning either “catching people in kingdom faith” or “catching and judging those who prevent the kingdom” (Jeremiah 16 uses the image of fishing for people as judgment).

I came not to call the righteous, but sinners (2:17), said Yeshua. He was calling them to a realization of the kingdom.

The days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day (2:20), which is a futuristic pronouncement of coming sorrow (a very prophet-like thing to say).

In 3:13; 6:46; and 9:2 he goes up on “the mountain” or “a high mountain” and gives revelation. It is a very Moses-like thing to do. In one of these instances, he said he would show those standing with him the kingdom (9:1).

To you has been given the secret of the kingdom, but to those outside everything is in parables (4:11), says Yeshua and then cites Isaiah as a precedent of a prophet, like himself, called to preach in a way that will bring judgment to the many but reward to disciples who hear and follow.

The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed upon the ground (4:26). Yeshua’s parables, even when not put into a form of “the kingdom is like” were generally understood to be about the kingdom.

The Pharisees and scribes sought a sign (8:11-13) from the prophet, perhaps not satisfied for some reason with the signs they already saw.

Yeshua made many other prophet-like pronouncements, including enactments with a fig tree and a long discourse on signs and coming events in Mark 13.

No wonder Schweitzer long ago depicted Yeshua historically in the category of a apocalyptic prophet. Likewise, Maurice Casey in his new and monumental historical Jesus book, Jesus of Nazareth, sees apocalyptic prophet as the main category for Yeshua.

In an upcoming series (“Messianism and Yeshua in Mark”) we will consider the further claim that Yeshua is Messiah. But from within the story, few could see that. Such a realization came mainly after the resurrection.

Even stories in which it seems people either hoped or actively pushed for Yeshua to take on some revolutionary role (deliverer from Rome), they may still have had prophet in mind more so that “king” or “one like David” or “Messiah.”

Ched Myers in Binding the Strongman summarizes well the ideas of resistance to Rome with the involvement of a prophet as the leader. Theudas (see Acts 5:36) promised to lead a group to the Jordan and part the waters, like Moses, Joshua, and Elijah. An action like this had military overtones, with Rome being like Egypt. In Acts 21:38 we have a reference to the Egyptian, a prophet coming from Egypt (but Jewish) who called followers to gather in the desert and come with an unarmed attack on Jerusalem. He said they would stand on the Mount of Olives and the walls of Jerusalem would crumble. This calls to mind not only Joshua, but also Zechariah’s words (chapter 14) about the Mount of Olives and the last battle. John the Baptist repeatedly denied he would lead any resistance movement, but he drew many followers out into the desert. His movement was packed with revolutionary potential.

The idea that many people regarded Yeshua as a prophet who might lead a popular resistance movement against Rome is not far-fetched. But Yeshua kept putting down such expectations. And as a prophet he gave off mixed signals, saying things about suffering, a cross, and being raised after three days.

What are we, as Yeshua’s followers now, to make of Yeshua as the prophet and even apocalyptic prophet?

It is in forgetting Yeshua’s role as a prophet that much modern religion has missed the mark. Prophets brought change in the present as well as cryptic foretastes of the future. Yeshua’s kingdom talk mysteriously is about future and present. Is the kingdom here now or coming? Many of Yeshua’s sayings can be read either way.

But when we combine Yeshua’s sayings and his actions, we find a pattern. He based present actions on the future realities of the kingdom. So, the kingdom now of Yeshua the prophet looks like the things he did and taught (healing, defeating evil, teaching love and service). The kingdom future will look like a world where everyone is healed, evil defeated, and love and service will be the norm.

So, if we take Yeshua as Messiah-for-the-future-only, as does so much modern religion, we miss the prophetic movement of Yeshua. It is about literal things, not spiritual realities to be realized in the future. Yeshua the prophet has a lot to say about how you relate to people now, to possessions, and to life itself.

Yeshua said in Mark 7:15, “there is nothing outside a man which by going into him can defile him; but the things which come out of a man are what defile him.”

I have always thought that this passage was one of the most penetrating, well-phrased, to-the-heart-of-the-matter statements of what Yeshua stood for. It’s actually only part of what Yeshua had to say on the matter. It’s what he said to the crowds, the outsiders, the ones who did not get private instruction as part of the inner circle. Mark 7:15 is rather vague and can be taken in some different directions all by itself.

Yeshua gives further clarification in vss. 17-23. I won’t go into detail about some of the controversial matters here. Many people wonder if Yeshua is nullifying the dietary law. You can find my take on that question in chapter 8 of Yeshua in Context.

What I am interested in in this podcast is the meaning of Yeshua’s ethical teaching here. We’re too quick to make blanket statements and simplistic arguments. I hear all the time, “God hates religion and loves relationship.” You can’t possibly read the Bible with intelligence and believe this. What God hates is not religion, but the kind of things some people make of religion and the kinds of religion the masses tend to settle for. These weak and sometimes evil forms leave people empty, unfulfilled.

Likewise, it’s simplistic to say, “Yeshua is against ritual purity laws.” That’s not the point.

I’m saying Mark 7 cuts through our shoddy notions of religion. It is not simply a rebuke against those scribes back then.

Neither is Mark 7 unique in Yeshua’s teaching. It is a thread that runs throughout it.

In one parable, Yeshua calls his movement a mustard bush. That is, Yeshua’s movement is an annoying weed that pops up in the religious scene which the official gardeners can’t get rid of. It results in sinners and gentiles and the great unwashed coming into the kingdom.

In a famous scene, Yeshua protests the Temple. It is his Father’s house. He has zeal for it, as his disciples testify. Why does he protest it?

The simplistic say, he was against the Temple. Those who look deeper say, he was against what the leaders made the Temple to be. It has become an unjust system, a burden on the people and a source of enrichment for the power-brokers.

His Father made the Temple a place not only of worship but also of feeding the hungry and filling the people with abundance. But the leaders demand the tithes of the people without fulfilling the purpose. They keep as much of the proceeds as they can and use the Temple as much as they can to perpetuate their power. They demand without giving.

Yeshua opposes the Pharisees again and again and modern religion completely misses why. So many modern religious people act just like the Pharisees Yeshua opposed.

They shut people out of the kingdom. All the while they congratulate themselves, “We believe in grace; we are not legalistic Pharisees.” Mark 7 doesn’t allow any of us the luxury of self-congratulation.

In spite of much rhetoric, much modern religion is no more than “come to our meeting so you can have the mark of being one of the saved.” And in order to accommodate the idea of grace, many have made the meeting more like a concert, so that the threshold is lowered and it is not so hard for large numbers of people to attend the meeting and have the mark of the saved. Come as you are. You can wear a T-shirt. But by God, get here. If you don’t, you’re missing God’s healing power and heading to a dangerous place.

No wonder Dietrich Bonhoeffer spoke of religionless Christianity as being so needed.

When people reduce the message of Yeshua to something as powerless as having the marks of the saved on you, outward signs like mere attendance, they have missed Yeshua completely.

Belonging to a community of believers is not and never has been, for Yeshua, about having the mark. Yeshua designed his community to be the place that IS and DOES his will.

How about we translate Yeshua’s saying in Mark 7: “Failure to attend meetings and bear the outward marks of faith is not what defiles, but righteousness comes from within, goes out from my followers, and comforts the suffering”?

What are the false notions of impiety in modern religion. They are many. Wrong music. Disinterest in shallow or boring worship services. Failure to apply the right bumper sticker or proclaim Jesus in a T-shirt logo.

Think about what Yeshua is actually saying in Mark 7: “Don’t worry that in the jostling crowds at Walmart you might contact uncleanness. It’s not contact from the outside that defiles. It’s what comes out of you, the wickedness in your heart. Your sense of superiority, I’m better than that woman. Your deceit. Your lust. Your grasping for self-enthronement is what defiles.

But you can get these words wrong too.

It’s not that Yeshua is saying, “Measure up.” Nor is he calling you to be a righteous individual.

First, a focus on measuring up will lead you astray. Don’t look at your shortcomings and feel unshakable shame. Look at all the good you can do and do it. Be a force for love, justice, kindness, goodness, service, help for those hurting.

Second, a focus on being a righteous individual will lead you astray. You were not created to be a solitary paragon of virtue. You made for others, to be with others, to be completed by others. You were made for God’s family.

But, you say, the congregation near me has it all wrong. Well, start somewhere. Yeshua’s generation had it all wrong too.

And no matter where you go, you’ll find people who want love, friendship, encouragement, help, and even to lend a helping hand.

But you will find that evil always pops up, in you and in others. Why be surprised? The power of sin is in perpetuating evil. The power of good is in reclaiming lost ground and advancing the kingdom of God.

While we are waiting for it to fully arrive, the kingdom of God is what we do together. It is what Yeshua taught us to do. Comfort mourners. Fill the hungry. See God. Supply needs. Right wrongs. Promote life.

Anne Moore, “The Search for a Common Understanding of God’s Kingship,” in Wayne O. McCready and Adele Reinhartz, ed., Common Judaism: Explorations in Second Temple Judaism (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2008).

Marc Zvi Brettler, God is King: Understanding an Israelite Metaphor (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1989).

What are the underlying beliefs of people in Israel in Yeshua’s time about God’s kingship that resonate when he speaks of the “kingdom of God”? What does Yeshua’s generation think of when God’s rule is raised as an issue?

Anne Moore’s thesis: “I propose that there was a common understanding of the kingship/kingdom of God arising from the common Scripture of Second Temple Judaism — the Hebrew Bible.”

Marc Zvi Brettler writes about the metaphor of God as a king, like the human rulers people were familiar with. The Hebrew Bible uses this metaphor in three ways:

1. God as absolute king of the people of Israel.
2. God as eternal-emperor of all the people of the nations of the world.
3. God as monarch-shepherd caring for the disadvantaged and marginalized.

Examples in the Hebrew Bible

1. God as absolute king of the people of Israel. Exodus 15:1-18, God as a warrior who fights on Israel’s behalf, the liberator-God whose rule is established on the mountain in the midst of the people of Israel. Numerous other examples, including: Exod 19:3-6; Deut 33:2-5; 1 Sam 8-12; Jer 10:1-16; Isa 41-44. God claims Israel’s allegiance as his special people, chosen for a close covenant relationship. The Exodus event is critical. Torah is the requirement of allegiance. Israel is viewed as unique, separate from the nations.

2. God as eternal-emperor of all the people of the nations of the world. Psalm 9:8-9 (7-8 in Christian Bibles), God’s throne is forever and from it he judges the peoples of the world with fairness. Other examples come from the poetic and prophetic literature: Jer 10:7; Dan 4:31; Psa 22:26; 47; 96:10; 103:19. God is comparable in these texts to emperors who rule not only their own nation, but others. The nations are subject to God’s judgments. People in the nations are called to praise and worship God. In some texts (Moore does not mention this), the relationship between God and non-Israelite peoples is described with intimacy similar to God’s relationship with Israelites.

3. God as monarch-shepherd caring for the disadvantaged and marginalized. Psalm 145, God is “my king,” a compassionate monarch who is personally involved in the worshipper’s life, who upholds the fallen and marginalized who call on him. Other examples include the shepherd verses of the Hebrew Bible (shepherd was a royal metaphor for one of the roles of a monarch), the image of God as “shield,” and royal verses expressing the personal relations between people and God: Psa 5; 9; 10; 22; 102; 103; 146; Isa 40:10-11. God is a king and protector (shield) of all the people, including the prisoner and the oppressed.

Examples in Second Temple Jewish Literature

1. God as absolute king of the people of Israel.

…Tobit 13:1, 3-5, 11, 17, Blessed be the God who lives for ever, because his kingdom lasts throughout all ages . . . acknowledge him before the nations, O children of Israel . . . his is our Father . . . he will afflict you for your iniquities but he will again show mercy on all of you. He will gather you from all the nations among whom you have been scattered . . . A bright light will shine to all the ends of the earth. Many nations will come to you from far away . . . bearing gifts in their hand for the king of heaven . . . The gates of Jerusalem will sing hymns of joy.

…Judith 9:12, 14, God of the heritage of Israel . . . there is no other who protects the people of Israel but you alone!

…Philo, Special Laws 4.164, Other kings bear scepters in their hands, and sit upon thrones in royal state, but my scepter will be my copy of the book of the Law; that shall be my boast and my incontestible glory . . . created after the image and model of the archetypal royal power of God.

…Jubilees 50:9, You shall not do any work on the day of the Sabbath . . . a day of the holy kingdom for all Israel is this day among their days always.

2. God as eternal-emperor of all the people of the nations of the world.

…Testament of Moses 10:1, 5, 7, This his kingship will appear throughout the whole creation. Then the devil will have his end. Yea, sorrow will be led away with him . . . the sun will not give light and in darkness the horns of the moon will flee . . . for God Most High will surge forth, the Eternal One alone. In full view will he come to work vengeance on the nations. Yea, all their idols he will destroy.

…Psalms of Solomon 17:34, He [Messiah] will be compassionate to all the nations who reverently stand before him.

…Sybilline Oracles 3:46-47, But when Rome will also rule over Egypt guiding it toward a single goal, then indeed the most great kingdom of the immortal king will become manifest over men.

…Targum on Zechariah 14:9a, And the kingdom of the Lord will be revealed among the dwellers of the earth.

3. God as monarch-shepherd caring for the disadvantaged and marginalized.

…Psalms of Solomon 5:1-2, 5, 8, 16, 19 Lord God, I will joyfully praise your name among those who know your righteous judgments. For you are good and merciful, the shelter of the poor. When I cry out to you, do not ignore me . . . when we are persecuted, we call on you for help, for you will not turn away from our prayer . . . for if I am hungry, I will cry out to you, O God . . . Happy is the person whom God remembers with a moderate sufficiency, for if one is excessively rich he sins . . . May the glory of the Lord be praised, for he is our king.

…Judith 9:11-12, For you are the God of the lowly, helper of the oppressed, upholder of the weak, protector of the forsaken, savior of those without hope . . . King of all creation, hear my prayer!

Examples in Yeshua’s Teaching

God, absolute king of the people of Israel

…Mark 1:15, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel.

…Luke 11:20, If I cast out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has already overtaken you.

God, the eternal-emperor of the people of all the nations

…Matthew 8:11-12, I tell you, many will come from east and west and sit at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness; there men will weep and gnash their teeth.

…Matthew 13:37-39, He who sows the good seed is the Son of man; the field is the world, and the good seed means the sons of the kingdom; the weeds are the sons of the evil one, and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the close of the age, and the reapers are angels.

God, shepherd-monarch of the fallen

…Luke 10:9, Heal the sick in it and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’

…Matthew 5:3, Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Zechariah’s prophecy of the king coming on a donkey is a critical view of kingship looking ahead to the messianic age when the ideas of dominion change into peace. In the early part of Zechariah 9, the warring peoples of the Mediterranean coast will become peaceful and submit to God’s authority in the messianic era. Then, in 9:9, Daughter Zion’s king (Jerusalem in the age when promises are fulfilled) comes not as a war-maker, but bringing peace, not on a warhorse, but a donkey like the Davidic kings of old.

Yeshua deliberately evokes this scene, so those who say this is about a prophecy fulfilled miss the point. Yeshua acts out the scene, proclaiming by his action that he is this different kind of king.

The scene creates excitement and tension in Jerusalem. Yeshua is not a Judean, so the people in Jerusalem thinking about the triumphal entry limit their understanding to the idea of a prophet from Galilee. They do not entertain the idea of a messiah from Galilee. But the crowds who are in the know, those who have followed Yeshua around, they proclaim him in clear messianic terms as Son of David. Yet the fact remains that not one in the crowd truly understood. Yeshua is not to be the vanquisher of Rome, but Rome’s redeemer. The theme of Zechariah 9 stands as a witness against revolutionary notions. Yeshua is the one who makes Philistines as if they are part of the people of Israel (Zech 9:7). Yeshua declares here exactly the sort of kingship he is bringing and until the resurrection, none comprehend it.

O the gladness of the poor in ruach, theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Yeshua makes desirable what is commonly regarded as unpleasant or pathetic. Our emotions are stirred by such talk. The imaginations and hopes of peasants sitting on the Galilean grass were stirred. It is something greatly to be desired, a reversal so needed by those of us who deeply feel our poverty of spirit.

What makes these Beatitudes pleasantly sweet is a combination of our trust in the one who speaks them and the attractiveness of their message. There is nothing in all Jewish literature after the Bible to compare with them.

The king, if we believe that about Yeshua, offers his kingdom to the unlikely. It is not because we are poor in spirit that the time of God’s rule on earth is extended to us. Rather, we can know our destiny is gladness and draw on that blissfulness now because the kingdom is ours.

In other words, poverty of spirit is not a condition of the kingdom, though some have read it that way. Rather, poverty of spirit is a condition in which many of us find ourselves without any say in the matter, just as mourning happens to us rather than being a virtue we cultivate.

The Beatitudes are further attractive to us because they are not spoken by just another religious teacher. Yeshua had two things that proved his words worthy of devoting one’s life. He lived what he professed and he gave evidence of having authority to back up his assurances. He comforted mourners and lifted up unimportant people. He showed that the kingdom of heaven can be partially here amongst those who will bring its qualities into life now. His kingdom aims were not simply to draw a following of desperate poor with a false assurance of future hope. Rather, he taught the movement that followed him how to become communities of healing while waiting for the full arrival of God’s reign.

And who could deliver such a counter-intuitive message with authority like Yeshua? He spoke of granting the right for his disciples to sit at his table in his kingdom (Luke 22:29-30) and demonstrated in life, death, and resurrection that he can keep his word.

Yeshua indicated that in some ways the kingdom of God arrived with him and in others that there would be a delay. Luke 10:9 is one of the “now” aspects of the kingdom of God in the “now and not yet” duality. How does Luke 10:9 inform us of one of the senses in which the kingdom had already reached Yeshua’s generation? What does it tell us about the kingdom in our day and in the future?

The story in Luke 10 is about Yeshua sending out seventy to proclaim and heal and exorcise demons. Luke Johnson comments, “The preaching of the kingdom of God is signaled by the power to heal.” In other words, an aspect of the kingdom of God was with Yeshua wherever he went (healing and liberating the possessed). And Yeshua sent that same kingdom power with the seventy.

The kingdom of God (God’s rule on earth) partially exists now, but will be fully realized in the future when human kingdoms are gone and God’s rule is unopposed. Many times “kingdom of God” simply stands for “the age to come.” And in the age to come, sickness and disability and demonic possession will all be done away with.

It was in the healing work of Yeshua and his followers that the kingdom reached his generation. The beatitudes clue us in to other aspects of the kingdom which can be brought into the here and now: comfort, peace, righteousness, lifting up the poor in spirit, etc.

Whether we can, in our modern context, go out with the same power as the seventy or not (some think we can, others do not), we can cause the kingdom to reach our generation much as they did, by bringing aspects of the age to come into the present wherever we are.