Gospel Reverb | Grace Communion International Resources Jane Williams—Year A Epiphany 4-Easter Prep 1
Jane Williams—Year A Epiphany 4-Easter Prep 1
Welcome to the Gospel Reverb podcast. Gospel Reverb is an audio gathering for preachers, teachers, and Bible thrill seekers. Each month our host, Anthony Mullins, will interview a new guest to gain insights and preaching nuggets mined from select passages of Scripture in that month’s Revised Common Lectionary. The podcast’s passion is to proclaim and boast in Jesus Christ, the one who reveals the heart of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And now onto the episode.
Anthony: Hello friends, and welcome to the latest episode of Gospel Reverb. Gospel Reverb is a podcast devoted to bringing you insights from Scripture found in the Revised Common Lectionary and sharing commentary from a Christ-centered and Trinitarian view.
I’m your host, Anthony Mullins, and it’s my delight to welcome our guest, Dr. Jane Williams. Jane is the McDonald Professor of Christian Theology at St. Mellitus College. She helped to found St. Mellitus before being appointed to professor.
She previously taught in both university and theological college settings and has traveled extensively within the Anglican communion, lecturing and preaching. And she has a particular interest in the flourishing of women within God’s church. Jane, thanks for being with us and welcome to the podcast. And since this is your first time with us, we’d like to know you a little bit, your story, and especially, what has you experiencing delight these days?
[00:01:34] Jane: What a lovely question, Anthony, and thank you so much for the infinite invitation to be with you. It’s a real joy. And I think particularly it’s a joy for me. I’m a lay person. I don’t regularly preach, but I do love to write about the lectionary and do that quite a lot. I’ve written quite a lot of lectionary reflections and I’m always amazed at how there’s always fresh insight to come out of Scripture. You think you’ve read it so many times, but it’s always fresh. It’s wonderful.
[00:02:00] Anthony: Yeah.
[00:02:00] Jane: What would you like to know about me? I’m a daughter of missionary parents. I was born and brought up in South India, which, as you know, has a very ancient Christian tradition of its own. They believe their church was founded by the Apostle Thomas. And so, I suppose I’ve always grown up in a Christian world that is bigger than any one denomination and always felt a very strong call to mission. But also, both my parents taught in a theological college in India, so I’m afraid theology runs through my DNA, totally. And I married a theologian as well, so there’s no escaping it.
[00:02:41] Anthony: Yes.
[00:02:42] Jane: So, in terms of that lovely end to your question about experiencing delight in these days — I mean on really different levels — I’m a grandma, which I love. And about to be … our daughter is about to produce a second grandchild. And that is such a really glorious role to have in relation to one’s grandchildren. So, that’s given me huge delight.
I’m also in the process this semester of teaching a course on doctrine, particularly centering around the Nicene Creed. Why do we describe God like this? And it’s a real joy to see students putting together things that they know and always believed and prayed and interacted with in the character of God. But putting it together and getting a bigger and bigger and bigger picture of how glorious God is. That kind of teaching is a great joy.
[00:03:38] Anthony: Isn’t it a joy to know that we are in a grand story that is carried on long before us and will go long after us as the creeds teach us.
Jane: Absolutely.
Anthony: That we’re a part of. And I celebrate your grandchildren. I have one grandchild who is showing up at our door today. I haven’t seen her in weeks, so I am living in a day of delight myself. So, it is wonderful that …
Jane: I’m trying not to keep you talking for too long. You’re going to go be grandpa.
Anthony: There you go. You mentioned you have a particular interest in the flourishing of women within God’s church. And from my perspective, so does Jesus.
So, what does it look like for women to flourish in the church, and what guidance would you give to church leaders who desire the same?
[00:04:25] Jane: I sort of feel it’d be lovely to stop having to have this conversation, wouldn’t it? And I think I would want to say, for women to flourish it’s the same as for anybody to flourish, which is to be allowed to really show the gifts that God has given them and share them. So, I think it’s to be attended to as a human being and not stereotyped constantly. Women are as different as men are and have the different gifts to offer.
And so, I suppose to leaders who want to help women flourish, I think it is that great gift of attention — actually pay attention to the person in front of you. Let them narrate themselves. Don’t make assumptions about who they are based on their gender, because I think we waste so much of what people have to offer by making assumptions about what that is and what it isn’t. So, just let people be who they are as much as you can, and enable that.
[00:05:28] Anthony: Yeah, it made me think, Jane, what you said — I think it was a quote from Lesslie Newbigin that talked about how we are shaped by what we attend to. And if we attend to people, human beings, and desire to flourish, and then, all boats will rise. We’ll all float.
And I’m just thankful that you’re shining the light on this particular subject. It’s a subject that we have tried to attend to within our own denominational tribe and it’s exciting to see women flourishing in many ways within our context. And I give praise to God for that.
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: What a beautiful gift it is.
[00:06:06] Jane: It’s such a helpful thing to say as well, Anthony, because there isn’t just a limited amount of attention to go around. It grows, doesn’t it? As we attend to each other, we grow in our capacity to attend and be attended to. It’s a generous gift, as you would expect as a gift of God.
[00:06:25] Anthony: Amen. Amen.
Let’s dive into the lectionary text that we’ll be discussing for this month. Our first pericope is 1 Corinthians 1:18–31. I’ll be reading from the New Revised Standard Version, the updated edition. It is a Revised Common Lectionary passage for the Fourth Sunday after Epiphany, February 1.
For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 19 For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.” 20 Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scholar? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? 21 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of the proclamation, to save those who believe. 22 For Jews ask for signs and Greeks desire wisdom, 23 but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to gentiles, 24 but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength. 26 Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to abolish things that are, 29 so that no one might boast in the presence of God. 30 In contrast, God is why you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, 31 in order that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”
Amen. Jane, if you were proclaiming this particular text to a congregation, what would be the focus of your proclamation?
[00:08:39] Jane: It’s Paul being really quite rude about the people he’s writing to, isn’t it? It’s quite fun to notice that he’s gently undermining them constantly in what he says about them: “not many of you are wise.” But clearly, from what we read about the Corinthians, they did think they were wise. It is partly helping them turn their own judgments on their heads as it were.
But I think if I were to focus on one specific thing, I think it would be verse 30. God is why you are in “Christ Jesus who became for us wisdom from God and righteousness and sanctification and redemption.” All of those things are gifts from God. Clearly the Corinthians, like so many of us, so much of the time, think that the wisdom and the righteousness and the sanctification and the redemption are our own doing. We’ve earned it in some way.
And this is just putting it so clearly that they are gifts from God given to us as we are in Christ Jesus. The sort of sheer liberating generosity of God in that that allows us to put ourselves down, let go of all our hangups about ourselves, let go of our self-posturing and so on, and simply be grateful for the action of God. It is extraordinary, isn’t it, to think about Paul so early on in the proclamation of the Christian gospel talking about being in Christ — that identity that is completely given to us in the action of God in Christ.
[00:10:27] Anthony: God makes the first move.
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: And you talked about Paul’s undermining of the people, having a little fun with it. And so, I want to ask you — you’re a theologian, scholar, academic, you’re surrounded by theologians: So, how does this statement make you feel, that he’s chosen the foolish — and I’m being a bit facetious — but what is the good news there?
[00:11:08] Jane: I think the good news certainly for me is that it is I am never going to be the one who shows people the full reality of God. And I am too stupid and I’m glad to be so. Any God that I would be capable of completely describing and demonstrating to others will be too small a God. And so, this is again, just a wonderful releasing statement. We don’t have to be the ones who tell what God is like. God is more than capable of showing God’s self to us and demonstrating God’s reality.
And so often that reality is counter-cultural and this foolishness of God that is actually the deep wisdom of the world, God as the One who gives God’s self constantly, who will do all that is needed to find us and bring us home, that extraordinary deep, deep wisdom that looks to us like foolishness because it’s so self-giving, so unselfish.
And so, in my own experience as an academic and a lecturer, I’m constantly humbled by my students. They ask me questions every year that I’ve never thought about. And every year they go on highlighting to me their willingness to offer their lives in the service of the gospel and for the love of God. And they teach me endlessly. I’m glad to be a foolish theologian.
[00:12:22] Anthony: Ha, ha, is that on your business card, Jane? Is that what you hand out?
Jane: It should be, shouldn’t it.
Anthony: I love the idea of being a lifelong learner. And there’s always something to learn from others, even those that are not as seasoned, let’s say as you are. That’s a gift. I’m just so humbled and grateful that you see it that way with your students.
[00:12:45] Jane: You should thank them, not me.
[00:12:47] Anthony: You know what? That’s true. That is true.
Let’s transition to our next pericope of the month. It’s Matthew 5:13-20. It is a Revised Common Lectionary passage for the Fifth Sunday after Epiphany on February 8. Jane, would you read it for us please?
[00:13:09] Jane:
You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything but is thrown out and trampled under foot. 14 You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. 15 People do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel basket; rather, they put it on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. 17 Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. 18 For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
[00:14:25] Anthony: I’m interested in your exegesis on this statement, “you are the light of the world.” And my curiosity goes to this place: In what ways is the Church of Jesus embodying this reality? And in what ways is the light diminished under a basket?
[00:14:45] Jane: Ooh! Such a good question. That phrase always takes me back to Isaiah, there in Isaiah 2, that glorious vision of God’s city on a hill and all the people streaming to it. And it’s one that Isaiah returns to more than once throughout the whole prophetic book, that the role of the people of God is to show, is to lift up God so that people can see God.
And I think that our primary calling as church is to remember that it’s about God. It seems such an obvious thing to say. But it needs saying over and over and over again. There is no point in the church if that point is not God.
[00:15:39] Anthony: Preach.
[00:15:41] Jane: So, we really pour so much of our energies into structures and programs and things to keep our own systems going. And all of that is wasted if it’s not primarily about God.
And so, I think the ways in which we embody this reality are often ways that we hardly notice. It is a miracle, isn’t it, that the people of God, the Church, continue, because left to our own devices, we mess it up so constantly.
Anthony: Amen.
Jane: And yet God continues to be faithful to us and enable us to keep coming back to God in Christ, in the power of the Spirit. Keep proclaiming the good news despite our own failures to believe it sometimes. And so, I think this passage makes me remember that our primary calling is not so that we should have a nice spirituality and a lovely prayer life, but so that we should be there as witnesses to the reality of God.
And I think we do that in some ways and in so many other ways we do diminish it. We put it under a basket. And I’m no great guru, but it seems to me one of the ways in which we hide that light under a basket is by making our faith something individual. This is about me and God.
Whereas, throughout Scripture, you can just see everything God gives, God gives to be shared. So, if we have the great privilege of coming to know God in Christ, that experience of the reality of God is always to be shared. Let’s not put it under any baskets.
[00:17:30] Anthony: That is so good, Jane, what you just said. We, especially here in the American West, we’re hyper-individualistic in our approach to things. And I never read of a faith that is privatized. It’s personal, no doubt, but never privatized. It’s always about the community.
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: Yeah. You mentioned about remembering and how forgetful we are sometimes to remember it’s about God.
I was just thinking this morning in reading through Exodus, just how the people of God, the chosen Israelites, just continue to forget about God’s faithfulness. Whether it was his provision of food, whether it’s provision of light at night, whatever it was, they were just soon forgetting. And it’s so easy to say, look at those guys. They just mess it up over and over again. And then it’s, oh, that’s what I do.
[00:18:23] Jane: Yes, exactly. Exactly. It’s so much easier to see it in other people, isn’t it, than in ourselves!
[00:18:27] Anthony: That’s right. That’s right. And so, in that way, remembering is actually a sacred and holy thing that we do. It’s a spiritual discipline because it reminds us of the hope that we have in Christ. For sure.
[00:18:40] Jane: I quote this whenever I’m allowed to Anthony, but this is a quote from the great writer on mysticism, Evelyn Underhill, and she said, “God is the interesting thing about religion.”
[00:18:53] Anthony: Ooh.
[00:18:55] Jane: And we keep forgetting that. We keep thinking we are the interesting thing or the ideas that we have are the interesting thing. But actually, God is the interesting thing about religion.
[00:19:03] Anthony: That is so good!
Jane: Isn’t it?
Anthony: I’ll put that in the show notes. Thank you. You didn’t ask for permission, but I’m sure glad you went for it. Jesus said, “Let your light shine so others may see your good works, and then give glory to the Father.” But it seems to me that we’re so often shining a spotlight in such a way that it’s giving glory to ourselves. It just seems that the spotlight isn’t a very good guiding light at all. So, how do we shine a light, Jane, in such a way to give glory to the Father?
[00:19:38] Jane: It’s a really tricky one, isn’t it, Anthony? Because the Gospels and Christian history are full of God giving us examples. So, seemingly, God putting the spotlight on particular people so that we can see a Christian life lived in the realities of this world.
I’m doing some work on the great women mystics of the Christian past. And they are sort of heroes, that we know about them because people have needed to see the spotlight on them, to give us a sense of what we’re capable of, what with each other’s help we are able to do in our life of faith.
So, we do need some spotlights, I think. But I think what’s interesting about that process is that on the whole, those people didn’t shine the spotlight on themselves. They offered themselves and their life and their teaching and their prayers to others, and others thought, I really need more people to see this.
So, the spotlighting came from others rather than from the individuals themselves. And so, I suppose that’s what I would suggest to us — that what we are trying to do always is to look at people who help us to see more and more what a human being, living in the love of God looks like. And so, the best way we can do that is that all of us, with our spotlights, shining it on people who’ve helped us to be where we are, who helped us in our journey of faith.
And then, perhaps, trying to shine the light forward, back, whichever way you’d want to think about it, so that the people who come after us can see that light, see that there are patterns of living that are lit up with the love of God. I think, yeah, I suppose my reservation would always be somebody who spots spotlights themselves.
[00:21:47] Anthony: Yeah. I think a proclaimer of the gospel, especially those that preach in a local church setting, you have a choice each and every time. Who’s the hero here?
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: Who gets the attention.
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: And I just believe if it’s done well, the congregation doesn’t leave talking about the preacher. They’re talking about God.
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: Look what God did.
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: And like you said, we see those patterns of Christlike living in others, and we want to spotlight them. But like you said, it comes from someone else, not themselves.
[00:22:23] Jane: And it’s so difficult to get that balance, isn’t it?
[00:22:26] Anthony: Yeah.
[00:22:26] Jane: Because preachers rightly tell stories about themselves because they want people to see the lived life. But if you come out of church, as you say, and all you remember is the story about a preacher, probably that didn’t work so well.
[00:22:40] Anthony: Yeah. Yeah. This is a side conversation in some ways, but one of the mistakes I made early on in preaching ministry was if I told a story about myself, Jane — and I hate to confess this — but I was always the hero. I was always doing things well. And it took a long time to realize, who am I pointing the light to when I do that? And so, I don’t do that anymore. And we’re works in progress, are we not, Jane?
Jane: We’re all works.
Anthony: Maybe you’ve arrived, but I haven’t arrived.
[00:23:16] Jane: I have not arrived. I always take great comfort from the fact that Augustine of Hippo got into great trouble for writing confessions, because people around him thought, that’s not what a church … that church leaders shouldn’t show themselves, warts and all. Church leaders should show heroic Christian living. But Augustine’s work has lived on, because he showed himself in pursuit of God and God in pursuit of Augustine. And that’s what we need to see.
[00:23:44] Anthony: Yeah. That’s so good.
It reminded me of … a mentor said this to me once, and I think it’s a good way of thinking about mentorship and discipleship. People need to know far more than your ministry highlight reel. They need to know where you’ve struggled.
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: And just be let into, to kind of pull the curtain back so they can see really, what does the life look like in faithfulness to God, as God is faithful to them.
Okay, let’s transition to the next pericope. It’s Matthew 17:1-9. It is a Revised Common Lectionary passage for Transfiguration Sunday, February 15.
Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. 2 And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became bright as light. 3 Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. 4 Then Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will set up three tents here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” 5 While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!” 6 When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear. 7 But Jesus came and touched them, saying, “Get up and do not be afraid.” 8 And when they raised their eyes, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone. 9 As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, “Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”
Speaking of letting your light shine: Transfiguration Sunday. It’s celebrated annually on the Christian calendar, and I’m curious what makes this mountain-side experience worthy of such an annual reminder?
[00:25:45] Jane: I think we always want to pay attention to something that the Gospels really highlight for us. And Matthew, Mark, and Luke, all tell us this story of Jesus’ transfiguration.
And so, as we enter into this story, we are doing that in the company of people who have heard it from the first century onwards, who’ve heard this story as one that deepens our understanding of God in Christ and therefore deepens our own Christian calling.
I think, for me, what’s really striking is that it is the reiteration of God the Father’s affirmation of the Son at baptism. And then this reaffirmation here in the Transfiguration. If the baptism is Jesus is total identification with us in our humanity, entering down into the waters of chaos to be reborn as the One chosen and called by God, this is Jesus’s reaffirmation in the love of the Father as he heads towards his death.
So, a really pivotal moment in the gospel stories where Jesus’ identification now is going to go even deeper. Jesus is going to come into death for our sake, so that there, Jesus will find him. And it’s a most profound place for the Father to say to the Son, “you’re my beloved” again, in the hearing of those who know Jesus and love Jesus.
And for us to hear that, those words that Jesus takes with him to the cross as he heads towards Jerusalem now in the final ending on the cross, a really, really significant grounding of that call to be with us even into death in the love of the Father.
[00:27:49] Anthony: I imagine when Peter and James and John were going up on the Mount and they did not have on their bingo card, so to speak, that Moses and Elijah were going show up.
Jane: No.
Anthony: And I’m curious. What, if anything, should we take from that? Is it significant? Is it just an afterthought? What’s going on here?
[00:28:06] Jane: I think it’s clearly theologically deeply significant that these are two absolutely outstanding narrators of the character of God, Moses and Elijah, in what we call the Old Testament scriptures.
Moses, the one to whom God entrusts the law, that is to shape his people’s life so that they may live out of God’s own character, God’s self-given character in the law. Elijah, the one who’s constantly calling the people back to faith, to God’s faithfulness to them and their faithfulness to God.
So, the law and the prophets here shown as witnessing to Jesus. So, the creed calls the Holy Spirit, the One who speaks through the prophets. And I think you get throughout the New Testament, you get this sense of God’s, the faithful continuous arc of God’s company, God’s faithfulness to us, God’s presence, God’s narration of God’s self to us.
And Jesus is the fulfillment of that. Moses and Elijah are clearly secondary, you might say. They’re saying they’re like the Father, saying, “Look at this. Look at Jesus. When you want to know about God, look at Jesus.” And yet that’s not a writing off, it’s not a wiping out of the way God has always interacted with God’s people, but a culmination of it in Jesus Christ that we’re seeing here.
So, huge theological significance. And reminds us how important it is for us as Christians to pay attention to the whole of scripture. And not just the New Testament, but the whole of God’s interaction with people from and creation through to fulfillment.
[00:29:58] Anthony: And thinking of Jesus being left alone in terms of Moses and Elijah appearing no longer and God saying, “Listen to him.” And it reminded me of something one of your colleagues said to me, “Jesus is the highest resolution image of God that we have.”
Jane: Yeah.
Anthony: And it’s a lovely way to think of it, that in him, the fullness of deity was pleased to dwell. God self-reveals and it’s glorious.
[00:30:29] Jane: And it’s incredibly moving, isn’t it? That quite rightly, the disciples are terrified. And Jesus reaches out and touches the sister God who reaches out in our reality and touches us. So, their fear and awe were proper. They were in the presence of the Shekinah, the great Presence, the glorious presence of God. And yet that glorious presence comes to find us in a human form to enable us to be touched where we really are.
[00:31:03] Anthony: One of the things that has always struck me about this text is the ending.
[00:31:08] Jane: Yeah.
[00:31:09] Anthony: They came back down the mountain. Peter was so overwhelmed by the experience, he’s, “Let’s hang out here. Let’s build some tabernacles and just stay up here on the mountain.” But life gets lived in the ordinary, mundane, common. Anything you want to say about that? I know you said you have a heart for mission. I’m just thinking that through with this text.
[00:31:30] Jane: It is at the heart, isn’t it, of everything that Jesus shows us about God is that God comes to find us. And so, our spirituality is not removed from reality. We are not called to step out of the world and become people who have no interaction with day-to-day living but actually to follow Jesus into the reality of the world around us.
And I love Peter. I think Peter so often blurts out what each of us would say. But we always wait for a Peter to say it for us.
[00:32:10] Anthony: That’s right.
[00:32:11] Jane: And so that longing to stay where we are, especially in a moment of glorious worship or encounter or something like that. But those moments are given to us so that we can take the good news into the whole world.
[00:32:29] Anthony: Amen and amen.
Our final pericope of the month is Matthew 4:1-11. It is a Revised Common Lectionary passage for the First Sunday in Lent, February 22. Jane, please do the honors.
[00:32:47] Jane:
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tested by the devil. 2 He fasted forty days and forty nights, and afterward he was famished. 3 The tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” 4 But he answered, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” 5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6 saying to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you,’
and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’” 7 Jesus said to him, “Again it is written, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” 8 Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, 9 and he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” 10 Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! for it is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’” 11 Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.
[00:34:06] Anthony: I so enjoy listening to you read. What is it about the Brits when they read? It just sounds so inviting and intelligent.
Jane: But that’s what we feel when you read.
Anthony: This is quite a text, is it not? And we’d be interested to know, if you were teaching it, what would you teach?
[00:34:27] Jane: I love this text and because I’ve written a number of small reflective books for Lent, it’s a text that I’ve written about and prayed about and pondered over in all kinds of different ways.
I would start by noticing that it is the work of the Spirit to take Jesus into the wilderness, we are told. And therefore, Jesus goes trustingly into this hard testing place. And he goes to find out. Remember this story immediately follows the baptism of Jesus, where he’s heard the voice of the Father saying, “Oh, my beloved Son.” He’s felt the presence in the Spirit upon him.
And then he’s driven out into the wilderness. And it is as though we see Jesus really confronting what it is to be told that he is the Son of God. What does it mean for Jesus to be the Son of God in this world and for us and for our salvation?
And the tempter is giving Jesus all the pictures that we would normally have of what it would be like to be the Son of God: the kind of power, the kind of safety, and the sense of God taking care of us, people admiring Jesus, that all of these kingdoms could be yours. That’s so much of what, left to our own devices, we think is important about the world — those kind of attributes. And over and over and over again, Jesus is able to reject them. And we see Jesus’ sonship really taking shape, I think, and these temptations.
And these temptations are what are going to enable Jesus when it comes to that terrible moment in Gethsemane to say, “Not what I will, but what you will,” because we see Jesus becoming through and through and through the person who will, under all circumstances, be the Son of God. And I think that’s what I find it incredibly moving: to see this description of Jesus in the wilderness, allowing the Scriptures, allowing the Spirit, allowing the Father to shape what it will mean for Jesus to be the Son of God in his ministry, in life, and in death.
And as I say, I think these choices are the ones that enable Jesus to be always, under all circumstances, Son of the Father. That’s Jesus’ most basic self-definition.
[00:37:07] Anthony: You pointed out that the Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness. And the wilderness shows up time and time again in Scripture in both testaments over 300 times. And it’s a significant metaphor and situation that we face in this world. What is the wilderness and why is it so important in Scripture?
[00:37:30] Jane: I suppose I come at it primarily as a doctrine and history scholar rather than necessarily a biblical scholar. And it’s fascinating to see, for example, in the work of the early monastic movement, the desert fathers and mothers. And that movement was just as Christianity was beginning to get a bit more comfortable, a bit more settled in the world — that movement of people being led by the Spirit out into the wilderness again.
And they see it very much as a place for doing battle with the devil as we see Jesus doing here in this particular story. Because here in the wilderness the devil is much more noticeable because there are few other distractions. And so, the desert fathers and mothers are very deliberately taking on, you might say the battle between good and evil for their own sake, but also for the sake of others.
As even more so, obviously, Jesus here in this account is overcoming the devil so that he can be the one who fulfills God’s calling to him. And so that really important sense of doing battle with the things that are preventing us from being who we are called to be, I think, is one of the big wilderness symbols because so much of our life is so distracted.
It is so easy not to notice the things that are actually holding us in through all the things that are taking up all our time and energy, the things that we, whether we would call it worship or not, the things to which we give the best of ourselves. They’re so insidious all around us that I think these wilderness times, whether actually physically going out into a place of quiet and retreat or the hard times that we hit, are times for really reevaluating and reminding ourselves that our most basic calling, that the only thing that can truly fulfill us is to be the children of God that we are called to be. So, taking Jesus’ example and constantly saying God first, God first, God first.
[00:40:03] Anthony: God first. That’s a great way to segue into what I was going to say. God first. I was going to mention how, from my vantage point, theology is enormously important and it’s an understatement even saying it that way.
Jane: Sure.
Anthony: Because it shapes how we see everything, the way that we think and talk about God. And I am of the opinion, if theology doesn’t lead us to greater worship and devotion, we’ve missed the point. It’s not just knowledge. It is about worship of this living God. So, as a final word, would you do us the honor of just heralding the good news that you see in this text about Jesus Christ who reveals the heart of God?
[00:40:51] Jane: What we see in Jesus is the lengths to which God will go to be God for us and to come and find us.
When Paul says in Romans 8, nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, that is because God will not let anything separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. And that’s what we see in this passage. It’s Jesus’ complete open identification with the task that God the Father has given him and which he has received with generosity and openness to be God for us.
“For us and for our salvation” as the creed says, and that willingness on God’s part to identify with us when we are so often unwilling to be the human beings that God longs for us to be. It’s one of those extraordinary mirror images, isn’t it, that God is willing to be a human being and so that we can be the human beings we are called to be.
But we don’t want to be human beings. We want to be gods. That’s the Genesis pattern that echoed in this wilderness account, that we know Jesus is really God because Jesus is willing to be God for us and not for himself.
[00:42:18] Anthony: Hallelujah. Praise God. Jane, I’m so grateful that you joined us.
I didn’t mention this to you, I don’t believe, but my wife and I, Elizabeth and I were sitting in a workshop session at the Duke Divinity Initiative of Theology and Arts, and you were one of the panel presenters about how art can be a gift in the midst of suffering.
And I sat there and I was so drawn to the wisdom that you taught with, the humility. And one thing I said to Elizabeth as we drove home that day is your precision of language. Your language was so informed by your experience with the Lord. I was struck by it and I thought, oh, I want to have her on the podcast. And fact that you said yes was such a delight. So, thank you so much for joining us.
[00:43:14] Jane: Thank you for the invitation.
[00:43:15] Anthony: Yes, of course. And I also want to thank our team, Reuel and Enerio, Michelle Hartman, and Elizabeth Mullins. This would not be possible without them. What a wonderful group of people to work with. And as is our tradition here on Gospel Reverb. We’d like to end with the word of prayer. So, Jane, would you pray for us please, as we close?
[00:43:32] Jane: It would be such a pleasure. Come, Holy Spirit, and open the Scriptures to us. Say that we may see Jesus. Come, Holy Spirit, and pray in us, Abba Father, so that we may be sisters and brothers of the Son, daughters and sons of the Father.
I pray in particular for all who read these texts that Anthony and I have been discussing — all who ponder them or who preach them or who try to live them — that every word will be filled with presence of the Spirit. With the joy of the Spirit and with the call to proclaim God who comes to find us, God who is for us, God who will let nothing separate us from his loving Christ Jesus, may these words come alive afresh as each person reads from ponders them and proclaims them. We pray this in the precious name of Jesus. Amen.
Anthony: Amen.
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