Saturday, March 23, 2019
Sacrificial Death through Interpreting: The Beatitudes and Psalm 37
**a reflection given in a time of prayer the morning of Thurs., March 7th (which I'm just now getting around to recording here)**
like a lamb that is led to the slaughter,
and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
so he opened not his mouth.
- from Isaiah 53: 7
This morning, in a time of daily prayer whose most common refrain is "Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner," I was given to see a particular relationship between Psalm 37 and the Beatitudes that extends through multiple generations and into the present.
In prayer, I saw that wonder at the correct interpretation of a story calls us to hope for mercy. And, vice versa, Mercy embodied in the Word of Life calls us to a posture where we must interpret stories and our places in them. We don’t proclaim authoritative facts from on high without presumption of taking the role of Jesus in the story of the world. Humbly, we enter into the body of a story and are left to ask our place in it.
But the meek shall inherit the land
and delight themselves in abundant peace.
- Psalm 37: 11
This verse might sound familiar to those of us who know the New Testament better than the Old. The context of the Beatitudes is not neutral. They aren't singular, atomistic, universal propositions or pronouncements offering obviously definitive and factual meaning over a clean slate of uncontested territory waiting to be interpreted and understood in the same exact way by any and everyone. Jesus wasn't speaking on the moon (nor was David). When David's commander wants to kill a member of Saul's family who is hurling curses and rocks at David, David's response is: "Who knows, maybe that's the voice of God in response to my life of voilence. We're going to have to wait this out. Be at peace with him." Different members of both Jesus' audience and David's would hear these blessed words in Psalm 37 of inheritance and peace very differently.
In his authority to identify, speak into, and judge the world of his time and place, Jesus is re-calling, remembering and reinterpreting ancient songs and oracles. Jesus proclaims the Beatitudes and re-enacts the Psalms before his audience, which is specific to his time and place but, requiring re-placement, recontextualization, or reinterpretation, extends to our time and place, too. His authority is why we should trust his interpretation of the world and not some other. Especially not our own!
The way we hear stories will depend on where we place ourselves in the story being told. It is by His Word that different audience members of his world and ours who are vying for their stakes and claims upon their various roles in the scriptural narrative find their final place. Who will be vindicated, and who will fall? Whether we really belong in the clothes of the character we imagine for ourselves, however, really isn't up to us. I'm sure Saul wouldn't have identified himself as "the one who prospers in his [own, self-assertive] way...the man who carries out evil devices!"
If the Beatitudes were a re-membering of ancient songs and oracles like this one, then "blessed are the meek...[and] pure in heart" is prophecy that we can be confident, in his authority, that he is re-enacting.
As a hospice nurse who is confronted daily by a death we neither control nor choose, this brings me great hope and comfort. Dying daily is training and practice for the bearing of our crosses, yes. But, it's also a reminder of how the world works, in general. We are dependent and vulnerable in ways we rarely acknowledge or imagine to simply get along in life by imagining a story or narrative for the world in which we are getting along, as well as our places in it. Our imagination for those things is borrowed from sources outside ourselves. That’s why we read what are are called SCRIPTures. And, we don't ultimately determine how the story - of which we are neither the authors nor the authoritative interpreters in the first place - unfolds and ends.
"Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner."
and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
so he opened not his mouth.
- from Isaiah 53: 7
This morning, in a time of daily prayer whose most common refrain is "Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner," I was given to see a particular relationship between Psalm 37 and the Beatitudes that extends through multiple generations and into the present.
In prayer, I saw that wonder at the correct interpretation of a story calls us to hope for mercy. And, vice versa, Mercy embodied in the Word of Life calls us to a posture where we must interpret stories and our places in them. We don’t proclaim authoritative facts from on high without presumption of taking the role of Jesus in the story of the world. Humbly, we enter into the body of a story and are left to ask our place in it.
But the meek shall inherit the land
and delight themselves in abundant peace.
- Psalm 37: 11
This verse might sound familiar to those of us who know the New Testament better than the Old. The context of the Beatitudes is not neutral. They aren't singular, atomistic, universal propositions or pronouncements offering obviously definitive and factual meaning over a clean slate of uncontested territory waiting to be interpreted and understood in the same exact way by any and everyone. Jesus wasn't speaking on the moon (nor was David). When David's commander wants to kill a member of Saul's family who is hurling curses and rocks at David, David's response is: "Who knows, maybe that's the voice of God in response to my life of voilence. We're going to have to wait this out. Be at peace with him." Different members of both Jesus' audience and David's would hear these blessed words in Psalm 37 of inheritance and peace very differently.
In his authority to identify, speak into, and judge the world of his time and place, Jesus is re-calling, remembering and reinterpreting ancient songs and oracles. Jesus proclaims the Beatitudes and re-enacts the Psalms before his audience, which is specific to his time and place but, requiring re-placement, recontextualization, or reinterpretation, extends to our time and place, too. His authority is why we should trust his interpretation of the world and not some other. Especially not our own!
The way we hear stories will depend on where we place ourselves in the story being told. It is by His Word that different audience members of his world and ours who are vying for their stakes and claims upon their various roles in the scriptural narrative find their final place. Who will be vindicated, and who will fall? Whether we really belong in the clothes of the character we imagine for ourselves, however, really isn't up to us. I'm sure Saul wouldn't have identified himself as "the one who prospers in his [own, self-assertive] way...the man who carries out evil devices!"
Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way, over the man who carries out evil devices! Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath! Fret not yourself; it tends only to evil. For the evildoers shall be cut off, but those who wait for the Lord shall inherit the land. In just a little while, the wicked will be no more; though you look carefully at his place, he will not be there. But the meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant peace."Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner."
- Psalm 37:7-11
If the Beatitudes were a re-membering of ancient songs and oracles like this one, then "blessed are the meek...[and] pure in heart" is prophecy that we can be confident, in his authority, that he is re-enacting.
Wait for the Lord and keep his way, and he will exalt you to inherit the land; you will look on when the wicked are cut off. I have seen a wicked, ruthless man, spreading himself like a green laurel tree. But he passed away, and behold, he was no more; though I sought him, he could not be found. Mark the blameless and behold the upright, for there is a future for the man of peace. But transgressors shall be altogether destroyed; the future of the wicked shall be cut off. The salvation of the righteous is from the Lord ; he is their stronghold in the time of trouble. The Lord helps them and delivers them; he delivers them from the wicked and saves them, because they take refuge in him.So, because Jesus is re-calling and re-enacting prophecies that call us to humble mercy, we rely on Jesus to interpret the world for us as we place ourselves in the story he tells. We open ourselves before the face of his Mercy seat as we begin to wonder or imagine who we are in the story. But, that's not all. It is only in him - in his Mercy and grace – where we have hope for justice as the story unfolds before us. I certainly am not the pure one. Like David, I tend towards a life of violence. But, in his baptisms in water and blood, Jesus binds himself to me in my death, which is the inevitable end of my life of violence. I can thus have confidence in my binding to his Life of righteousness and redemption.
- Psalm 37:34-40
As a hospice nurse who is confronted daily by a death we neither control nor choose, this brings me great hope and comfort. Dying daily is training and practice for the bearing of our crosses, yes. But, it's also a reminder of how the world works, in general. We are dependent and vulnerable in ways we rarely acknowledge or imagine to simply get along in life by imagining a story or narrative for the world in which we are getting along, as well as our places in it. Our imagination for those things is borrowed from sources outside ourselves. That’s why we read what are are called SCRIPTures. And, we don't ultimately determine how the story - of which we are neither the authors nor the authoritative interpreters in the first place - unfolds and ends.
"Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner."
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