Christ our Hope Anglican Church Valparaiso

The uncomfortable message of Jesus is that the Son of Man — the glorious King, the promised Messiah — has not come to primarily to save his people from their difficult circumstances… from Rome, from powerful men with evil in their hearts, from the broken systems of injustice… not yet. First, he comes to save his people from themselves.

If we understand what Paul is saying here, we actually will have the internal delight and quiet confidence that we think of when we use the words “joy” and “peace”, but it’s important to understand that we’re not called to have that state in spite of our circumstances but because of them. Because Jesus really is that good and kind and lovely, because the deepest powers of the universe really are at work on our behalf… that’s where our peace and joy come from.

We are citizens of Jesus’ kingdom, called to live here on earth like people whose whole identity is caught up in our King. As a result, we live as people whose law, values, rights, and obligations are defined by a totally different standard than the people around us.

We don’t earn our status before God, we don’t obtain it through our own strivings, rather we come to Jesus, the center of all things, and at his feet we kneel, cast all things aside, and trust ourselves completely to him.

Paul is full of joy because he can see that his service to the gospel is bringing glory to the Messiah, and so he can be confident that his life is going exactly how it’s supposed to go. Whether he lives or dies, he proclaims Jesus either way.

The transfiguration is one of the major revelatory events of Jesus' life. The Father gives us the command to listen to Jesus. This is the command we take with us, as Jesus walks with us down from the mountain top experience and back into the valley of normal and sometimes dark days of regular life.

Jesus shows us love that dignifies, that speaks truth, and that treats even his enemies as people—as image bearers, as those created by God and called by God to good purposes, even if they refuse to treat him in that way. He came to show the Father’s love, and made himself low to raise us up.

Jesus is the man the psalmist celebrates, and he is the “blessed one” spoke of in the beatitudes. He the man who walks not in the council of the wicked, the tree planted by streams of water. And his blessing looks like an all-powerful king descending into poverty; it looks like a man who mourns the consequences of a rebellion he did not authorize, so that the very ones who hate him might enter into joy. Jesus becomes poor to make us rich, and he invites us into a life that looks like his.

When Jesus shows up and invites us into the blessing of obedience, it’s likely to feel at the moment like a burden. But if we trust him, and say yes to his good plans, we will find that he gives us good things—often even better than what we thought we wanted.

In Christ—the fulfillment of the law and the fulfillment of Israel's calling—God accomplishes the promise and the purpose of the law and of Israel. In him, the God of Israel reconciles himself with the people of all nations, humans who have been so twisted by sin that even when we encounter his goodness our impulse is often to recoil from him so we can maintain our own illusion of control.