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Matthew 28.16-20
Matthew 28.16-20
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Trinity Sunday
Shelton, WA
Hope and Hesitation
It’s fitting, I suppose, that the closing scene in Matthew’s Gospel takes place on a mountain. In a way, it had to be. Throughout his gospel, mountains have played such an important role for Matthew. There’s the Sermon on the Mount, the transfiguration happens on a mountain top, the end times discourse takes place on a mountain, and of course, there’sCalvary. So it’s fitting that for Matthew the final scene in his gospel takes place on a mountain.
Mountains are significant. So often it seems God is encountered on mountains. The burning bush was on a mountain. Elijah met God in a cave on the side of a mountain. Noah and the ark came to rest on a mountain. God gave Moses the law on a mountain. Mountains are significant.
Yet there is also a problem with mountains. Sometimes mountains can seem very distant—like something off on the horizon… visible, but not quite within reach.
Sometimes that’s how folks see God. They believe in God. They say there is a God. There’s a general acknowledgement that God does exists. But for so many God out there… far away… up in heaven. God is watching us, but God is watching us from a distance.
There’s something of that going on in our text here this morning. Let’s see if we can’t set the scene. The first thing we need to do is forget about the Easter narratives we’ve just come through. We need to set aside the Emmaus encounter, the upper room appearance of Jesus to the disciples and to Thomas. We need to suspend in our minds the meal by the sea and the ascension. The accounts of Luke and John are important, but for now we need to focus on what Matthew is telling us.
Matthew’s gospel, you remember, began with a most remarkable declaration: “‘Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,’ which means, ‘God with us.’”
Emmanuel… God with us… that’s the portrait Matthew paints across the pages of his gospel. For Matthew, the Messiah isn’t simply another Moses; he is not merely a deliverer… a miracles worker… a teacher and law-giver. Certainly, the Messiah does do all those things, and all those images are important for Matthew. But the Messiah, according to Matthew, is much more than that. The Messiah is “God with us.” That is the good news Matthew lays out for us. God has come. God is no longer distant. God has taken on flesh and blood and moved into the grim and the grit of the world.
The twist, though, camewhen this “God with us” was killed. Taking on flesh and blood and moving into the grim and grit of the world is one thing. But to suffer, bleed and die… to be rejected, forsaken, buried in a borrowed tomb… now that’s a whole different sort of thing. That might make a person reconsider. That might make a person hesitate before making a commitment. That might even make a person doubt.
And that’s pretty much where we find the eleven disciples. The two Mary’s had been to the tomb. They say it was empty. They say they saw an angel who told them Jesus had been raised from the dead. They say they saw Jesus. They say Jesus told them to come to this mountain in Galilee. But as of yet,not one of the eleven had seen Jesus for themselves. There was a lot of uncertainty here. A lot of questions still unanswered… a lot of doubt and ambiguity.
As a matter of fact, Matthew tells us that when the eleven saw Jesus, some worshiped; but some doubted. The word used for doubted here is different than the one used in John 20 when Jesus tells Thomas to stop doubting and believe. The word there means “without faith;” it’s the word ἄπιστος
Here, the word is different. It’s the word ἐδίστασαν. Rather than meaning without faith, it literally means “to stand in two places.” It’s not the kind of doubt that is unbelief or faithlessness. It’s not the kind of doubt that stands over and against faith, shaking its fist in defiant rebellion. It’s the kind of doubt that hesitates. It stands at a distance wondering… waiting… watching. It wants to see what happens before it decides… before it commits.
And when you think about it, that’s where I think a lot of folks are in our world today. They’re standing in two places. On the one hand they see the world around them. They see 78,000 people killed in Myanmar. They see 50,000 killed in the earthquake in China. They live in a world that seems to be spinning out of control. It seems to be unraveling like a ball of yarn rolling across the floor. And they’re part of that great unraveling.
They are standing in a worldwhere suffering abounds. Where injustice promotes the wealthy and oppresses the oppressed. Where the rich keep getting richer and the poor are forgotten and ignored as they sink deeper into poverty. A world where might makes right—whether it is individuals or nations. Where violence and death are the weapons used to impose ones will on another. Where fear dominates the innocent, and a callus indifference works like a narcotic numbing whole societies to all that’s wrong.
They are standing in a world where we send our kids to schools where kids kill other kids… where parents do their best knowing that their best isn’t always enough. A world where expectations seem too high to obtained, too lofty, too unrealistic, and yet the alternatives seem even worse…a world where things are out of control, where the problems passed down by past generations seem insurmountable, where hope seems a distant and forgotten memory.
Yet on the other hand they stand in another place as well—a place where they know deep down inside that somewhere there is hope. Or at least, the hope there is hope. Call it the imago Dei, call it Prevenient grace… call it what you want… but there is something latent within all humanity that does not totally despair of all hope. There is something that hopes that even though it appears quite to the contrary, thing will work out for the good.
I think that’s probably what brought the disciples here to this mountain in Galilee. Hope. Remember, in Matthew’s gospel only the two Mary’s have seen the risen Jesus. The rest of the disciples only have their word for it. In Matthew’s time line, all this has happened very quickly—the women went to the tomb, Jesus said to go to Galilee, and they went.
Perhaps they remember Jesus’ words about not leaving them as orphans and that whole Johanian upper room discourse. Perhaps… but more likely it was the echo of the words of the prophet Isaiah still ringing in their ears… “‘and they shall name him Emmanuel,’ which means, ‘God with us.’”
God with us, that’s the hope that rang in their hearts as they listened to the two Mary’s tell them about the empty tomb, the angelic messengers, and the risen Lord. God with us, that’s the hope that had sustained them as they watched Jesus’ ministry unfold. As Jesus preached that the kingdom of God had indeed come, they watched as that kingdom made its way into their world through Jesus. They experienced “God with us” as the watched the blind receive sight, as the lame walked, as they the leper was made clean. They experienced “God with us” as they saw the multitudes fed on a hillside, as they saw the wind and the waves and the storm obey his words, as they watched the man at the tombs set free from a legion of demons. They experienced “God with us” in that upper room as Jesus took the bread and the wine and spoke of a new covenant—one established in grace, faith, and love. And even though they didn’t realize it at the time, they experienced “God with us” on that Friday as they watched Jesus hanging on the cross. As a matter of fact, it was probably in that moment that “God with us” was most fully revealed.
The disciples may have come to that mountain standing in two places—hope and hesitation—but they left confident in one thing. Not that there wouldn’t be doubt, not that there wouldn’t be suffering, not that therewouldn’t be uncertainty and hesitation and even times of despair. No, their confidence was in Emmanuel—God with us. “And remember, I am with you always,” Jesus says,even “to the end of the age.”
Even in the midst of duplicity Jesus is with us. Even while standing in two places, Jesus stands with us. The truth is we live in a divided world—a world where the kingdom of God is the already-and-not-yet-kingdom. It is not yet because we have not reached the end of the age. It is already, because Jesus has promised to be with us always. It is not yet because this world still suffers from the affect of sin. It is already because in the presence of Jesus the power of sin is broken. It is not yet because there is still oppression and brokenness. It is already because Jesus is right here with us… suffering with the oppressed and the broken. It is not yet because there is still much to be done. It is already because the end is certain, the outcome is settled, justice will prevail, good will overcome, faith will find fulfillment, hope will be rewarded, love has triumphed. Jesus is here.
Gracious heavenly Father, precious Jesus, loving Holy Spirit; fill us anew this day with the hope of your presence. Let your glory and majesty flood over our lives. Fill us with, O God, with a sense of your imminence. That is our cry and the deepest desire of our heart. Your presence is enough. With that we are satisfied. We ask this through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
John GrantPage 19/10/2018