Pentecost XVII
In our continuing story... this week we have Jesus and the disciples not only reaching Jerusalem, but encountering the religious authorities in the Temple, the heart of the life of the city and the people, full of symbolism and ritual, all of which underlines the power and authority of those in charge of the religious system -- and the power of those Romans with whom those authorities made a deal to stay in power.
A few weeks ago, we read that amongst teaching, healing, and proclaiming the immediacy and presence of the kingdom of God in our midst, Jesus tells the disciples that they are heading eventually to Jerusalem... where he might very well be killed.
That's what happens to prophets in that city as it is today, he tells them. Conflict with ‘authority.’
No, Peter says! And, Jesus' famous rebuke follows: Get behind me, Satan; stay away, don't tempt me away from the point of my mission to Jerusalem, which is to speak truth to power there. They're puzzled, but they continue to follow him, discovering more about the economics and manifestations of the Kingdom of God along the way (grace is unlimited!; God is mercy!; the last will be first, the first shall be last!…).
So, today, a story about authority and identity. That parable Jesus tells -- very unsuitable people are surprisingly following the ‘true authority’ of God ('entering the kingdom') even as the supposed heirs are piffling away their time and not respecting the ‘authority of God,’ not seeing or entering the kingdom that is right there for them, now, always pulling us all, judging and transforming us all.
The story is full of not so veiled criticism of ‘the authorities’ and, well, their authority. Jesus tells this cautionary parable to an appreciative crowd, and he tells it, perhaps, for the same reason he just asked those authorities - after they questioned his authority to speak - that confounding question about John's prophetic work in the world (baptizing all who came to him for repentance and the proclamation of the kingdom of God!): who ‘authorized’ John to do *his* work in the world?
Think of where and how this phrase shows up in the early stories about Jesus: who is this? He speaks as one with authority!
How and when does one gain authority to speak, to heal, and to proclaim the kingdom of God's mercy and justice in our midst? Is there an audition or a credentialing board?
Jesus' authority comes from God, we would say in our tradition. But, another way of phrasing this is to say that Jesus' authority comes from inhabiting and incarnating the Word of God so fully that Jesus' words are necessarily words of justice, mercy, and love -- for such things define God. And, to proclaim mercy, to speak in the dialect and parables of mercy, say, is to inhabit them; to inhabit them is to speak with authority. The proof of the authority is in the content of the speaking, if you see what I mean.
Jesus' authority is not for its own sake -- that is the position of a megalomaniac or a narcissist, centuries ago, and certainly now.
The authority of the ‘Word Incarnate’ of God is not for its own sake, but is ‘authorized’ for the world, for the proclamation of mercy. It could not do or be otherwise, or it would not be the word of God. If I may paraphrase Paul’s famous writing in II Corinthians, "...if I speak in the tongues of angels and men, but have not Love, …then I have no authority." See what I mean?
What is our relationship to claimed power and authority, and to the legitimacy of those attempting to wrest power and ‘speak authoritatively’ in our own day?
If power is simply seeking its own perpetuation, then it is not authoritative at all, not in the sense Jesus uses the word in his dialogue with the 'authorities' of his day -- and this is why he is openly challenging their authority -- who are they to speak? they are not proclaiming the kingdom of God in their 'authoritative' speaking, he suggests, and so their authority is suspect.
Indeed, their very identity as 'authorities' is likewise suspect. And threatened.
Beloved in Christ: Seek to incarnate love-that-is-God, and God's mercy, truth, and repentance in your own life, and you will then be able to ‘speak with authority.’ We will all be called to do so, each in our own way. Do so, knowing - as Paul wrote to the little gathering in Phillipi centuries ago - knowing that, "...it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for God's good pleasure."