Commentary on Lectionary for April 24, 2011

Easter Sunday

Acts 10:34-43; Psalm 118: 1-2, 14-24; Colossians 3:1-4; John 20:1-18

Sermons like Peter’s in Acts 10 may be responsible for the image of Jesus as judge, spending his newly risen life keeping track of all of our sins. In our culture, we would translate this into wearing a wire or using video cameras and then transferring the data to gigantic spreadsheets, with huge red numbers summing up the extent of our failures. After all, Peter said in his sermon: “42: He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead.”

If it is any consolation, Peter followed this up in his very next sentence with this assurance: “43: All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”

Brian McLaren (A New Kind of Christianity), however, suggests a different definition of the word “judgment,” one that no one who likes to threaten others with hell, could ever agree to. The usual definition of divine judgment is built around the sorting of sheep and goats in Matthew’s last judgment scene. The goats go into everlasting torment.

But what if we define judgment as: “putting wrong things right;” as meaning “reconciling and restoring, not merely punishing; healing, not merely diagnosing; transforming, not merely exposing; revaluing (or redeeming),not merely evaluating” (McLaren, 203). This definition gives new meaning to Peter’s words that “everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins…” The reason is that believing in him will involve being sensitive to the needs of the poor and disadvantaged; sharing your wealth; loving your enemies and telling everyone there is good news: the world can be changed; there is a force afoot that overcomes death and evil. That force has a name, and it’s the Spirit of Jesus.

Looking at judgment in this way makes it okay to offer your services to God. He will help you make things right. Together, who knows what may be transformed: relationships? Institutions? All of a sudden, we are collaborators in creating the kingdom of God. Our freedom is still intact, as Paul warns in Colossians. We can still do very bad things, even AFTER we have decided for God.

But in this risky life, in which the chances are great we will still be lured to make many mistakes and do downright selfish things, how consoling, heartening, enlivening it is to know that Jesus lives, that he has ascended to his Father and to OUR Father.

We have new cause to sing with the Psalmist: 14The Lord is my strength and my might; he has become my salvation… 17: I shall not die, but I shall live, and recount the deeds of the Lord. “