Biblical forecasts of destruction, suffering, and the loss of human life have only one purpose: to call God’s people to repentance. In the case of Jesus’ prophetic lament over the destruction of Jerusalem, the overlay of temporal perspectives adds to its rhetorical force. In all likelihood, Luke and his readers knew that the destruction of the city had already occurred, just as Jesus said it would. Luke’s rendition of Jesus’ prophetic words draws on the words of Israel’s prophets and reflects the events that actually occurred. Echoes of familiar warnings and flashes of scenes from the assault on the city underscore the fateful warning. It would and did happen just as Jesus and the prophets had said it would. The fulfillment of Jesus’ warning so recently and so fully serves also to drive home Luke’s description of Jesus as one greater than a prophet who fulfilled the prophets and “all that is written”. Jesus’ words are devoid of any joy of triumph or vindication. Consistently, Jesus laments the fate toward which the city is rushing headlong. There is no place here for anti-Jewish sentiment, no place for the triumphalism that so often cheapens and perverts Christian teachings regarding the future. Even the Roman general lamented the tragedy of Jerusalem’s destruction. Can a Christian do less when warnings of judgment come to pass? “When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near”. When nations unleash their military might against other nations, the result is inevitable: desolation and horrors that repulse the human mind. Jesus counsels the disciples to join neither the Romans nor the resistance but to flee. They have no place in this conflict. Alas for the mothers and their infants. Civilian casualties—now spoken of as “collateral losses”—often outnumber those of the enemy forces. The danger of reading Jesus’ words as a warning about an isolated event in antiquity or merely as a forecast of the deserved fate of Jerusalem robs the text of meaning or relevance for today’s readers. On the contrary, Jesus laments the fate of those who have consistently rejected God’s prophets and God’s call for repentance from a way of life that leads to a breakdown of justice, order, and peace. Jesus’ confrontations with the leaders of the people in Luke 20 are directly connected with his forecast of the city’s destruction. The leaders were like the stewards who wanted to keep the produce of the vineyard for themselves; they killed the owner’s son and eventually lost the vineyard. Give Caesar his due—maintain civil order—but live all of life as befits those made in God’s image. Otherwise, oppression and anarchy will beget violence with all its savage consequences. Let us calculate the times and the seasons, but let us look to the rising incidence of violence, especially in areas of deprivation and poverty—neighborhoods surrounded by armed gangs. What sort of response do these signs of the times call forth from the Christian community? Movies about what life will be like in the future in metropolitan areas regularly depict a society overcome by violence and polarized between warring factions. In its own way, this secular vision of the future serves as a prophetic warning, but unlike the Hollywood script, the biblical vision offers no hope that violence can be redemptive. There is no salvation at the hands of a violent hero of superhuman strength and ability in combat. The only hope that Jesus offers is the call to repent, the call of obedience to his gospel for the poor and the outcast, and his assurance that “by your endurance you will gain your souls”.… One of the inescapable facts of life is that every life comes to an end, and the end of life lends urgency and significance to each new day. For those who have no faith and no knowledge of God, death stands as a final denial of life. All that we may attempt or do is eventually swept away by time.…[T]he Gospel teaches that beyond the end of time stands the [Sovereign God], who has come among us in the person of Jesus. Those whose lives are lived under Jesus’ [Sovereignty] can live expectantly, filling each day with activity that is meaningful because of its divine mandate and its contribution to the fulfillment of God’s purposes for human life. Similarly, the end of time or the end of life holds no terror for those who know God’s love because they know the one who determines the reality that lies beyond what we can know here and now. Thus those who know Christ as the [Begotten] of God can approach the end with heads raised high, knowing that their redemption is near.--R. ALAN CULPEPPER, New Interpreter’s Bible Vol. IX
Posted on: Sun, 23 Jun 2013 05:55:06 +0000
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