Luke 10:1-24 is a text which has come up repeatedly for me during our time in South Africa. Several weeks ago, for example, Wayne Hochstetler, with his wife Lois worker care staff for Mennonite Mission Network, led our Mennonite worker team on a study of the text. Deep reflection on a biblical text, first alone and then in the company of others, never fails to produce valuable insights—words for life.
On that day, then, Lois pointed out something from the story which I had not noticed before: a possible meaning for the dust which the messenger of Jesus “wipes” from his or her feet “in protest” against the towns that reject the messenger. It seems to me, on the one hand, that—as the text states—the wiping away of dust is indeed for the town that rejects those who come with the “authority” of the One who sent them “ahead of him” (10:19, 10:1). Indeed, the wiping away of dust is an act of “protest against” (10:11). Such a recognition, however, need not negate Lois’s point: that the wiping away of dust is also an act for the messenger.
For those who are sent by Jesus do have a job to do. Namely, that is to proclaim “peace” and the arrival of “the kingdom of God”, accept hospitality from those who welcome, and “heal the sick” (10:5-9). But failure to remove the “dust that clings to one’s feet”, the dust acquired in the town to which one has been sent—the dust of rejection—is to destroy the messenger, to take the messenger out of the service of God. For the messenger’s own well-being, for his capacity to remain the messenger of “peace”, an emissary of “the kingdom”, and a “healer” for others, he must “wipe away the dust that clings”. Rejection of the good things that the messenger brings must not derail her calling to bring “good news” to those who will welcome it. Rejection by some must not impede acceptance by others. We must “wipe away” the rejection that “clings”, “laying aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely” (Heb 12:1), in order to remain ourselves within the “love, joy, and peace” of God’s very presence.
Perhaps it was the seventy’s very obedience to Jesus’ command of “wiping away” that enabled them to return “with joy” to the Lord. Their joy was not a feeling wholly dependent upon the good will of others; their identity was not wholly in the success of their work. Or, if their identity did lay in human acceptance or worldly success, Jesus did not permit them to dwell there. It was not the work itself—the demons cast out—but the intimacy they experienced with God while going on their way—that their “names are written in heaven”—that was their “joy” (10:17, 20). Indeed, theirs was as Jesus’ own, who “for the sake of the joy set before him”—and for no other earthly reason or rationale (for there was none)—“endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God” (Heb 12:2).
Our God, as we concluded together on that day, is a God who “absorbs” our burden. God bears the rejection we sometimes take—in order that we might press on “ahead of him . . . to every town and place where he himself intend[s] to go” (10:1). We proclaim, we forgive, we heal, we go the extra mile, in Jesus’ name, but we do not effect the acceptance of our gifts: Reconciliation is “from God” (2 Cor 5:18).
-Joe
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