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              The Galilean Messiah by Rev. John Wichman

Our Study Groups can get pretty deep. That’s the intention. The Thursday Evening Study Group at Betty’s house has been watching and discussing the DVD series on Characters in Scripture with Prof. Amy Levine. Much of the time, especially if the character is an actual his-torical figure for whom non biblical documentation exists, the biblical authors’ character li-cense is evident. And we are moved to explore more clearly the message these ancient authors may have intended.

As expected these understandings and perspectives often conflict with some of the “authorized” and sanitized interpretations that we encounter in our church experiences. Real and intensely enlightening conversation takes place. We don’t always leave these discussions with all the loose ends tied nicely together. Sometimes we are left with more questions than answers. Again, that’s the intention.

It was like that the last Thursday in May. The different historical and biblical portrayals of John the Baptist, who was executed by the elitist benefactors of Roman rule, led us into an in-tense conversation about how it came to be that Jesus’ who was executed by the Roman gover-nor and the ruling elite became formulated as “Jesus dying for our sins”.

I have come to understand that as the followers of varying interpretations of Jesus began to grow and spread through out the Roman Empire, it was often pragmatic if not necessary for practitioners to apologetically downplay the reality of Jesus as a threat to imperial rule and oppressive status quo. This became habitual in maintaining the patronage of Emperor Con-stantine upon his Imperial legitimization of “Christianity” . This is not to say that what survived didn’t get under the skin of various rulers or and power brokers since then. But Jesus dying for your sins is a lot less threatening than, “We are followers of one who was crucified for defying the protocol of oppression. And as followers we claim the resurrection of that very one” I can see how that might have at least been kept discreetly understood as opposed to the professed sacrificial “Lamb of God” concept. But the lamb thing, the “Jesus died for our sins” (as opposed to because of our sin), has come to be the dominant theme and we have
inherited a religion that enjoys and thrives on the patronage of oppressive systems. And God’s kingdom that we pray will “come to earth”, the one illustrated by Jesus life, the one professed by the prophets, the one that speaks and lives for justice, the one that says the first shall be last and the last shall be first, that one, is kept at bay in some heaven far away.

So we got into it in that Study Group; who is it that we are representing in our ministry out of Westminster Hills Presbyterian Church, Hayward? Who is it that we claim to follow? Is it the so-called orthodox interpretation that calls on us to lift up Jesus as God’s sacrificial lamb? When’s the last time anyone you knew sacrificed a lamb to God for the redemption of any-thing. I know, I know. We don’t have to anymore because God sacrificed Jesus the lamb. Other than improving the air quality where is transformation, where is justice?

I walked home from that discussion troubled by this contradiction between what the life of Jesus represented and this irrelevant sanitized doctrine pimped by the royal court minions in the name of the Church
The idea that we, the Church, as an institution in this powerful consumer driven nation are so oppressed that we must keep the prophetic and disruptive Galilean messiah buried in a tomb of cozy irrelevant, sanitized doctrine is an arrogant cop out. It allows the practitioners of an obese religious persuasion to step over the homeless, the immigrant (AKA sojourner) those orphaned and widowed by greed (remember those biblical characters) and claim victim hood because they can’t pray their so-called “Christian” prayers out loud in public school (Never mind that Jesus pretty much smacks down public prayer in the Sermon the Mount).
And so, once again, for nowhere near the first time, I wondered, what are we professing at Westminster Hills? The message implied by such discussions, such thinking is anything but popular when most people go to church for ultimate answers and easy formulas for a complex life. How much of consensus or clarity is there at Westminster Hills that the Gospel is more often threatening than comforting? Are we lukewarm in our outreach as a result of this reali-zation?

Yes, I was raving in my head when I got home from that Study Group. Then I picked up and started reading a book I’d bought at a Presbytery meeting, “Jesus in the Hispanic Community, Images of Christ from Theology to Popular Religion” I began reading the first article, “Elements for a Mexican American Mestizo Christology” by Virgilio Elizondo.

Virgilio raises the question, why do the Gospel writers emphasize so strongly that Jesus was a Galilean? What was the import of Galilee? After all, history would be “aware of Rome, Athens and Jerusalem with our without Jesus.” Without Jesus Galilee would be less known than Hay-ward CA.

The Galilee of Jesus time was an outback, with no other significance than its location on major trade routs between ancient and contemporary empires. That being the case it was an incredi-bly diverse region peopled by the refuse of cultures and from widely scattered places of ori-gin. Know of any elite gated communities or high end neighborhoods located at the foot of a freeway off ramp? Archeology and Social Anthropology give credence to this description. The elites, the educated, the sophisticated folk of Judea referred to Galileans as impure. The in-tended implication was that given the diversity of low class people in the area Galileans were, whether accurate or not, a mixed race people to be despised and ridiculed.

According to Elizondo, the emphasis on Jesus’ social station and regional/ethnic origin was a crucial element of the Gospels. He goes on the state:
“The mission of Jesus is not some sort of esoteric or aesthetic truth. He comes to live out and proclaim the supreme truth about human beings and humanity that will have immediate and long-term implications in everyday life and in the history of humanity. Those who hear his word and are converted to his way will see themselves and will equally see all others in a radi-cally new way. This new image of self and of others will allow everyone to relate with each other as never before.

“Because of his concrete human identity, Jesus had personally suffered the pains of margina-tion, ridicule, and dehumanizing insults. He was concerned with the pains of hunger, sickness, bad reputation, rejection, shame, class, struggles, loneliness, and all the real sufferings, of hu-manity. His concern was not with abstract, but real and immediate. He spoke with the Samari-tan woman, and ate with the rich, the tax collectors, and public sinners alike. He did not feel repelled by the leper, and he enjoyed the company of women and little children. Jesus was truly at home with everyone, and everyone evidently felt at home with him. In his ministry, Jesus had the ability to enjoy himself in common table fellowship with everyone without ex-ception”

To represent a Galilean Messiah in Hayward! Hayward is one of the most, if not proportionally the most, diverse municipality in the State, surrounded by major Interstates, peopled by refu-gees and immigrants from every place on the Globe and struggling for an identity in the shadow of The City, Oakland, San Jose. Westminster Hills, a congregation that has found itself nurtured and energized by involvement in and with the struggles of this community.

As we enter into intense conversation about our future we hear that question Jesus asked his disciples. “Who do YOU say that I am?’ Do we market a palatable and sanitized Jesus like those for whom religious “purity” makes exceptions that Jesus DID NOT make? The opportu-nity has arrived to profess the Galilean Messiah precisely because of who we are and where we are. It’s time to make it clear, because we are blessed to be in a place and time that demands it.

Thanks be to God John