Liturgy: Do We Really Know this Man from Nazareth?

What is the King’s Liturgy? King’s Liturgy defines our experience together as a Christian community. It outlines the rhythms we celebrate with the Church at large: Scripture readings, Sabbath habits, and celebration of Holy Days and historical events.

This Week’s Lectionary Readings
Exodus 24:12-18
2 Peter 1:16-21
Matthew 17:1-9
Psalm 2

This week’s liturgy is contributed by Dominic Zappia, Instructor of Biblical Studies:

Psalm 2 is most often read messianically. In it, God’s anointed—identified as his son and king—comes to destroy the nations that rage against the Lord. The NT authors specify that this figure is Jesus, the Christ (i.e., the Anointed). In both Matt 17:1-9 and 2 Pet 1:16-21, Jesus’s transfiguration is recounted and the authors tell us that at this event God declares Jesus to be his beloved Son, with whom he is well pleased. This phrase echoes Psalm 2, revealing Jesus to be God’s anointed son, his promised king. 

If we turn back to Psalm 2, as Christians we may be tempted to read it with joy. With God, we can laugh and hold the nations in derision as they take counsel against the Lord and his Anointed (Ps 2:4). We can cheer when we hear that the Messiah will break the nations “with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel” (Ps 2:9). We can celebrate because we take refuge in Christ, our savior (Ps 2:12). 

And yet, when we put Psalm 2 in conversation with the Transfiguration and the picture of the disciples in Gospels, we must ask ourselves if we really know this King. Do we truly grasp who he is and what he asks of us? Or, are we—like the kings of the earth—setting ourselves against the Lord and his Anointed, without realizing it (2:2)? 

In Matt 17:1-9, it is clear that the disciples were caught off guard by Jesus’s transfiguration. They did not completely understand Jesus prior to it. As they witness Jesus transform before them, they are told that Jesus is God’s beloved son with whom he is well pleased, but they are also commanded to “listen to him” (Matt 17:5), as if to say that they had not done so. The disciples’ surprise comes out more clearly in Mark where the narrator tells us that when Peter suggests that they make tents for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah, he does so because “he did not know what to say, for they were terrified” (Mark 9:6). In this event then, they encounter Jesus in a unique and unexpected way. Before it, they do not fully know who he is, and even afterwards, they continue to misunderstand him and what he teaches.

Peter’s ignorance of Jesus’s identity is a repeated theme throughout the Gospels (especially in Mark and John), and it is something that happens with all the disciples. This motif is most clearly seen in Mark, and it occurs at the climax of that Gospel (Mark 8:27-38). In 8:29, Jesus asks his disciples who they say he is. Peter responds with “You are the Christ” (Mark 8:29b). Jesus then teaches them that he “must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again” (8:31). Peter reacts to this by taking Jesus aside and rebuking him (8:32). 

In Matt 7:21, Jesus warns his listeners that “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.” In fact, Jesus says that “many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness’” (Matt 7:22b-23). 

When we come to Psalm 2, we need to ask ourselves: do we really know the significance of this man from Nazareth and what he is calling us to do? Or, are we like the disciples prior to the resurrection, the Pharisees, and so many others, who think that they know Jesus and his teachings but really project upon him what they want him to be? Do we read our own worldview into his teachings? This is a challenging question, but it can be resolved by being committed to listening to Christ and by accepting his teachings even when they conflict with the way we think this world ought to be. For each person, this point of tension between how we think things should be and the Lord’s commands will be different, but for every person it means that we take up our crosses, die to ourselves, and follow Jesus. This loss of life is where true life is found. If we fail to do this, then we may find ourselves outside the gates of God’s kingdom.