The Scandal of Christianity

I know what some of you may be thinking, and no, I’m not talking about that scandal. And I’m not talking about the other scandal that you may be thinking about. I’m talking about the scandal of the Holy Spirit—God in us.

In John 14:16-18;20, Jesus is quoted as saying the following:

“If you love me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever—the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you know Him, for He lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you…On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.”

Over the past week, thousands flocked to the streets to see Pope Francis, to hear him speak, to reach out and touch his hands, many hoped that he would bless them and their prayers. The pope even addressed a mass of 20,000 people at Madison Square Garden. The Papacy is respected enough command respect wherever the Pope goes so much so that the President and Prime Ministers of nations personally welcome him. In his first days in the United States, he even addressed all of Congress while captivating the attention of nations.

The existence of the Papacy, or office of the Pope as the leader of the church, is a powerful reminder and proof of the reality that Jesus actually existed. To be redundant, the only reason that there is a Papacy is because of Jesus. This same Jesus, whose life, teachings, and ministry the Bible testifies to actually walked this Earth and the church was birthed from His ministry on Earth. Many Catholics believe that Jesus ordained the Papacy when He told Peter that he would be the rock upon which Jesus builds His church. Some Protestants would disagree that this is what Jesus meant when He spoke these words. Regardless, the point is that the papacy is the longest standing office of leadership on Earth and a visible reminder of Jesus’ existence and ministry. And even if anyone wanted to deny Jesus’ existence, every day the calendar reminds us that He lived. In citing the year as 2015 Anno Domini we are reminded that before AD (meaning “In the Year of our Lord” as recognition of Christ’s Birth” there was B.C. or Before Christ. Imagine that, the calendar year testifies to Jesus’ existence in that He is the only figure who splits time in half—time is literally ordered around Him. But I digress.

While there are debates as to whether Jesus actually ordained the office of the pope as a sort of promise in speaking the aforementioned words, Jesus makes another promise about one who He will send to remind His followers about His teaching and testify about Him:

“If you love me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever—the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you know Him, for He lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you…On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you..” John 14:16-18;20

This is one of the original scandals of Jesus and His ministry: God in us. Jesus tells His disciples that it is for their good that He is going away because unless He goes away, the Advocate, His Holy Spirit, will not come to them; but if He goes, He will send His Holy Spirit (John 16:8). This promise was such a big deal that after Jesus’ Resurrection, while His disciples who have now become apostles in witnessing the resurrection are preoccupied with knowing when Jesus will restore the Kingdom of Israel, Jesus’ response is essentially, don’t worry about that right now, what I want you to focus on is the power that you’re going to receive when my Holy Spirit comes upon you and that you’ll be my witnesses (Acts 1:6-8). So not only does Jesus remind His followers about the promise post-resurrection, He tells them to not even go forward as His witnesses

If we take Jesus’ words about Peter being the Rock upon which He’ll build His church seriously, how much more seriously should we take the promise that Jesus adamantly reiterates time and time again that His Holy Spirit will come to be not just with us and inside of us—making our hearts His home?

Earlier, I said that God in us through the Holy Spirit was one of the original scandals of Christianity, but before that, the scandal of Christianity that actually led to Jesus’ crucifixion was that God took on flesh and dwelled amongst us as a human being through Jesus. To many religious leaders of His day, Jesus was not just a rebel, but He was also utterly blasphemous. John 5:18 says “they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but He was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.” In fact, the notion that the Creator God could become a human being is still scandalous, and even absurd, to many people.

In Islam, the one unforgiveable sin is shirk or associating partners with the Divine. This is what Christians do when they worship Jesus Christ as the Son of God. The Qu’ran opposes all teachings that claim Jesus’ Sonship to God—He is to be honored as a prophet and nothing more. And yet the New Testament and Jesus in His teachings and actions insist “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14).”

And while the Bible and Jesus in His teachings ask His followers to take a leap of faith in believing that He truly is the Messiah—the fulfillment of Jewish hopes and expectations—and also God in the flesh the notion of God coming to dwell amongst His people was nothing new. The God of Israel was known around the ancient world to be the God who delivered His people from the bondage of Pharaoh with a mighty and outstretched arm through miraculous signs and wonders. Then after delivering His people, God traveled with His people and led them in a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. And what was special about the Tabernacle that God commands Moses to build when after the exodus from Egypt is that God’s presence would come to abide amongst the Israelites.

In Exodus 29:44-46, God is said to promise the following to Moses:

 “So I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar and will consecrate Aaron and his sons to serve me as priests. Then I will swell among the Israelites and be their God. They will know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them out of Egypt so that I might dwell among them. I am the Lord their God.”

And before the Exodus, the Creation story of the Biblical narrative was unique in telling the story of a God who created human beings from an overflow of His love. God not only provides for them, but He walks and talks with them.

Furthermore, the vision of heaven that the apostle John is given while on the Island of Patmos as described in Revelation is a vision of God coming to dwell with His people.

And I heard a loud voice on the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and He will live with them. They will be his people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. Revelation 21:3-4

This is what will make heaven so special, the eternal presence of God made fully manifest all around us.

So you see, from the very beginning, God has been pursuing humanity longing to lavish His love on us. The Scandal of Christianity is that a God who is perfect in all of His ways would continually pursue a sinful and broken humanity and still continues to welcome us into His presence. Before Jesus, God’s presence dwelled in the Tabernacle in the most Holy of Holy places. With Jesus, God makes our hearts His Tabernacle and our bodies His temple in coming to dwell inside us through His Holy Spirit presence. I do not have sufficient words to underscore how amazing and absurd God’s love for us is, that in spite of ourselves, in spite of our sin, He still longs for us to know Him intimately. And it’s not because God needs us or is dependent upon us in anyway. He chooses to love us.

I wonder what would happen if we got as excited about God’s Holy Spirit continually abiding in us as we did about the Pope coming to the United States. How different would life be if we walked in the authority of knowing that the same incomparably great power that God exerted when He resurrected Christ from the grave and seated Him in heavenly places is what He promises His people (Ephesians 1:19-21). How would that news that God lives inside us change the way that we see ourselves, the way we treat our bodies, the way we treat other people as image-bearers and spirit or potential Holy Spirit carriers? What would recognition of this news do for our prayer lives? How much more would we be able to hold our heads high and walk in confidence even in the midst of turbulent times proclaiming that we are not defeated no matter what our circumstances look like, but rather we are indeed more than conquerors because the Eternal God who created this Earth is not only going before you but is living inside of you?

Look y’all, there is a Resurrection Power that God has placed inside of you that is yearning to come alive to enable you to walk in the victory and the authority of being a child of the Most High. This resurrection power if your birthright, so I pray for you all in the same way that Paul prayed for the church at Ephesus:

¹⁷ I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. ¹⁸ I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, ¹⁹ and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength ²⁰ he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, ²¹ far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. ²² And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, ²³ which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way. Ephesians 1:17-23

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

9.30.15