In Explaining Jesus | Experiencing Christ, we will together explore how understanding the historical Jesus can shape our own faith, actions and experience with him today.

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What was the Cultural Matrix of the historical Jesus?

Sometimes the decision to get INVOLVED brings joy and sometimes it brings pain.

The social world or cultural matrix of Jesus was in CRISIS.

The Roman tax policy created a system of DOUBLE TAXATION for the Jews.

The politics of HOLINESS dominated the Jewish world as a response to Roman occupation.

Three active renewal movements INTENSIFIED the politics of holiness.

These cultural dynamics created a social group called SINNERS and OUTCASTS.

Roman INJUSTICES and LOYALTY to the Jewish politics of holiness were leading to war.

What was the Historical Jesus then amid this Social Crisis?

Jesus was a SAGE who challenged conventional wisdom by teaching an alternative WAY.

Jesus taught an image of reality: ULTIMATELY Spirit that is gracious and understanding.

Jesus ate with SINNERS to demonstrate his image of reality. (Mark 2:16)

To describe this quality of God, Jesus most often used the word COMPASSIONATE.

Jesus used three primary images for his alternative way of TRANSFORMATION.

1. A new HEART (Mark 7)
2. CENTERING on God/Spirit (Lk 16:13; Mat 6:19-21)
3. The way of DEATH (Lk 9:23)

Jesus was the founder of a JEWISH revitalization movement grounded in COMPASSION. Mat 10:5-6; Lk 6:6

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Explaining the historical Jesus invites us to experience the living Christ as a compassionate GUIDE on the narrow peacemaking PATH.

How can I live this in my everyday, normal life?

QUESTION conventional wisdom and modern holiness politics.

CENTER your life on the compassionate, caring loving nature of Spirit.

Consider BAPTISM as a ritualized way of choosing the path Jesus invites you to follow.

How does this make me a better person and the world a better place?

Compassion makes suffering UNACCEPTABLE in a community. 

What is God inviting you into today?

1. Consider where in my normal, everyday life I need to give a more compassionate response to others.
2. Read the gospel of Luke through the lens of the clash of a politic of holiness and a politic of compassion.
3. Sign up for Baptism April 16.

Thought provoking questions:

1. What would you describe as the conventional wisdom of American life?
2. Have you ever felt the weight or exclusion of the politics of Holiness in your own life? When and how?
3. Why do you think Jesus felt so strongly regarding his vision for compassion over holiness?
4. What are the implications for those outside of Judaism if the historical Jesus’s message and movement were meant to revitalize and even rescue Jewish life from war with Rome in the first century?
5. How have you experienced the compassion of God that Jesus taught? If you had any kind of upbringing in faith, was it grounded in compassion or holiness?
6. If compassion makes suffering unacceptable, where are we as a culture and even a church not seeing or acting with compassion?