The encampment of the Israelites on the plain of Jericho
would have been enormous. It would also
have caused exactly what we see in the kings of the surrounding nations,
fear. When you realize that the Land is
possessed of seven nations at the time, you get a sense of just how formidable
a nation the size of Israel would have been to those who stood in the way of
their possession of the Land. Only in a
place the size of Egypt could they have realistically incubated to the size
they had reached. As Joshua prepares to
move into the land he sees a man with a drawn sword who will not declare
himself either foe or ally. He is the
commander of the Lord's army, and it is down to Joshua to decide whether to be
foe or ally of this one man who represents the army. Joshua kneels before him. Wise move.
Then, the man tells him what Moses heard from the bush, take off your
shoes, this is holy ground. It is the
Lord's.
With all the hubbub about Jesus at the time, how excited
would someone who knew Him or at least knew of Him, would be when they were
told, "The Teacher says, My time is at hand. I will keep the Passover
at your house with my disciples."
That announcement, following on the triumphal entry only a few days
before when the people hailed Jesus as the fulfillment of their messianic
expectations, would surely have raised visions of the ushering in of the
messianic age, the restoration of the kingdom and in particular the restoration
of Jerusalem. The disciples would have
been truly startled to finally hear Jesus say that His time had come after
hearing it had not come so often. The
expectation of the Jewish people at Passover, then and now, is that this will
be the time when, in fact, the kingdom is restored. Everything pointed to this being the
moment. How odd and out of place it
would have been, then, to hear Jesus speak of betrayal. I believe Judas' expectations and also then
his disappointment at Jesus' failure to step into the role, led him to this
act, to force Jesus to take action.
Paul recognizes that the kingdom is being realized but that
it exists in the midst of the kingdom of the world. The kingdom is being realized in and through
us who are citizens of the kingdom of God by virtue of our belief in Jesus as
Messiah who has come and who will come again.
We are, in the words of Stanley Hauerwas, resident aliens in the
world. Paul lays out the contours of how
to live as resident aliens. He takes
evil in the world for granted and says don't be overcome by it but instead
overcome it with good, as Jesus did. His
words assume we understand we will have enemies and there will be evil formed
against us as we navigate this life but says we are to be like Jesus, not
repaying evil for evil and leaving judgment and vengeance to God. We, like Joshua, have to decide which side to
align ourselves with, God or otherwise.
It is not up to Him to align Himself with our agenda but the other way
round.
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