3 Lent
March 15, 2009
The Dark Side of the Good Lord
by
John Christianson
John
2:13-22
- 13The
Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14In the temple he found people selling cattle,
sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. 15Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out
of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins
of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16He told those who were selling the doves, “Take
these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” 17His disciples remembered that it was written,
“Zeal for your house will consume me.” 18The Jews
then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” 19Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in
three days I will raise it up.” 20The Jews
then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years,
and will you raise it up in three days?” 21But he
was speaking of the temple of his body. 22After he
was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this;
and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.
According to the old story, the pope called all of his
staff together, and he said, “I have good news and I have bad news. First the good news: the angel Gabriel appeared to me and he
announced not only that Jesus will return tomorrow, but he’s coming to
Rome! The bad news: he’s really ticked off!”
Change the story just a little. It’s the Jewish high priest. “Good news:
for two-thousand years we have waited and finally, today, the Messiah is
coming to the temple. The bad
news: he’s really ticked off.”
Only
now it’s not a joke, is it. It’s
history. It’s today’s gospel.
Ask
anybody to describe the Good Lord and they’ll use words like kind, gentle,
gracious and mild. Certainly that’s
Biblical. You can see that side of
Jesus in scores of places. You just
can’t find that familiar Bright Side of the Good Lord anywhere in this gospel
lesson. There’s no Good Shepherd here,
cuddling a lamb in his arm while he strolls a green pasture.
One
of our Lord’s twelve disciples was Simon the Zealot – a real radical – probably
a terrorist. The poet, Ezra Pound imagines Simon, describing
the dark, but maybe just as admirable side of the Good Lord. First, you need to know that, in this
dialect, the word fere means Mate or Companion.
Now,
listen to the Ballad of the Goodly
Fere by Ezra Pound
Ha' we lost the goodliest fere o' all
For the priests and the gallows tree?
Aye lover he was of brawny men,
O' ships and the open sea.
When they came wi' a host to take Our Man
His smile was good to see,
"First let these go!" quo' our
Goodly Fere,
"Or I'll see ye damned," says
he.
Aye he sent us out through the crossed
high spears
And the scorn of his laugh rang free,
"Why took ye not me when I walked
about
Alone in the town?" says he.
Oh we drank his "Hale" in the
good red wine
When we last made company,
No capon priest was the Goodly Fere
But a man o' men was he.
I ha' seen him drive a hundred men
Wi' a bundle o' cords swung free,
That they took the high and holy house
For their pawn and treasury.
They'll no' get him a' in a book I think
Though they write it cunningly;
No mouse of the scrolls was the Goodly
Fere
But aye loved the open sea.
If they think they ha' snared our Goodly
Fere
They are fools to the last degree.
"I'll go to the feast," quo' our
Goodly Fere,
"Though I go to the gallows
tree."
"Ye ha' seen me heal the lame and
blind,
And wake the dead," says he,
"Ye shall see one thing to master
all:
'Tis how a brave man dies on the
tree."
A son of God was the Goodly Fere
That bade us his brothers be.
I ha' seen him cow a thousand men.
I have seen him upon the tree.
He cried no cry when they drave the nails
And the blood gushed hot and free,
The hounds of the crimson sky gave tongue
But never a cry cried he.
I ha' seen him cow a thousand men
On the hills o' Galilee,
They whined as he walked out calm between,
Wi' his eyes like the grey o' the sea,
Like the sea that brooks no voyaging
With the winds unleashed and free,
Like the sea that he cowed at Genseret
Wi' twey words spoke' suddently.
A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea,
If they think they ha' slain our Goodly
Fere
They are fools eternally.
I ha' seen him eat o' the honey-comb
Sin'
they nailed him to the tree.
Oh,
that’s a stirring piece of poetry!
Excuse me if you think I was overly dramatic. You can’t just read that poem.
You have to DECLARE it! Because
the poem is so powerful, and the Jesus it describes is so powerful and the
relationship it describes is so powerful you end up envying even Simon the
zealot.
Does
the poem give a distorted picture of Jesus?
Yes, I guess it does. Jesus
wasn’t usually like he sometimes was.
It’s like today’s gospel lesson about the cleansing of the temple. Sometimes Jesus got ticked off. When he did, it was clearly “righteous
anger.” But that’s never the Jesus we
see when the poor or powerless came to him – even clearly sinful people. The eyes of that Jesus didn’t flash
anger. They were warm, deep,
understanding and compassionate eyes.
Those were the eyes that it seems children always saw – and also his
disciples and the women who traveled with them, and most people. So, what can we learn from those few
passages where Jesus gets angry, like John 2 or Matthew 23?
I’d like to pose an example for
you. Suppose there was a beautiful park
in your town with a playground for the kids.
Young folks flew kites there and played baseball and touch football,
boys and girls walked hand in hand, and there was even a place for old folks to
throw horse shoes or play shuffleboard.
Sometimes church groups used the benches for Bible Studies. A wonderful park! The only drawback was the square around the old gnarled oak
tree. For some reason, over the years
dozens of people had been hit by lightning and killed in that square – nowhere
else – just in “lightning square.” So
what would you do about it? I’ll tell
you what I’d do. I’d recognize that
park as a town treasure and enjoy it.
But I’d never set foot inside “lightning square,” and I’d warn others
about it.
So
you ask, what does that have to do with Jesus cleansing the temple? Well, I think it outlines a principle. Most of the time in the New Testament we see
the Good Shepherd, the Prince of Peace.
That’s the Jesus who’s so easy to love.
Then, once in a while, he flashes righteous anger – always for
cause. Seems to me there were three
causes that upset Jesus.
- Irreverence or
blasphemy against his Father.
- Self-righteousness.
- Abuse of children or
other vulnerable people.
(All
three of those faults are present in our text.
No wonder Jesus got upset.)
So
the lesson here seems quite clear. If
you love the Bright Side of the Good Lord, and you would like to avoid the Dark
Side of the Good Lord, then stay out of “lightning square.” Try to avoid sin of all kinds, for your own
good, but especially avoid the three causes that seem to upset Jesus the most.
- Irreverence or
blasphemy against his Father;
- Self-righteousness;
and
- Abuse of children or
other vulnerable people.
Let’s
stay out of lightning square and bask in the Bright Side of the Good Lord.
Amen
(Comments
to John at john.christianson@stjohnsofmound.org )