In Bethlehem, or Nazareth,
(the Gospels disagree on birth),
under Augustus' reign, to Joseph
and Mary, a child came to earth.
The tradition says a virgin birth,
a star, magi from the East,
shepherds in the fields at night,
a manger when no room at the feast.
These are the infancy narratives,
theological reflections made
years after, when the community
was thinking what had been conveyed.
The core historical facts are few.
He was a Galilean Jew.
He grew up, probably in Nazareth,
learned carpentry as Joseph knew.
At thirty or so, he left his home,
went to John at the Jordan's flow,
was baptized, heard a voice from heaven:
"You are my beloved son, I know."
Then into the wilderness forty days,
tempted by whatever Satan meant,
and afterward he began to preach
the kingdom's immanent advent.
"Repent, for the kingdom of God
is at hand." The same as John the Baptist.
But where John had preached apocalypse,
Jesus spoke of mercy as the rest.
He called twelve disciples, fishermen,
tax collectors, a zealot too,
and traveled through Galilee preaching
in synagogues and open view.
His teaching had three main features:
parables, beatitudes, love commands.
The parables told stories without resolution,
leaving thought in the listener's hands.
The prodigal son, the good Samaritan,
the mustard seed, the sower of fields,
the lost sheep, the lost coin, the lost son,
the pearl of great price, the treasure it yields.
The beatitudes inverted the world:
"Blessed are the poor in spirit,
blessed are those who mourn, who hunger,
who are persecuted for my merit."
The love commands were two and radical:
"Love God with all your heart and soul.
Love your neighbor as yourself."
On these two hung the Law's whole.
But he added one that no one had said:
"Love your enemies. Pray for those
who persecute you. Be perfect as
your Heavenly Father is, who bestows
sun and rain on the just and unjust both."
This was the new, the radical turn.
Not just mercy to your tribe or friend,
but mercy to those whose hate you earn.
He healed the sick, cast out demons,
raised Jairus' daughter from the dead,
raised the widow of Nain's son,
raised Lazarus four days in the bed.
He walked on water in the storm.
He fed the five thousand with few loaves.
He turned the water into wine.
He calmed the sea with breath he blows.
The Gospels frame these miracles as signs,
as breakings-in of the kingdom new,
as demonstrations that death and demon
were not the final word, it's true.
He chose twelve for the twelve tribes of Israel,
symbolic of restoration complete.
He taught the disciples to pray "Our Father,"
giving the kingdom's prayer to recite.
He reserved his sharpest words not for
the sinners, the prostitutes, the thieves,
but for the religious professionals,
the Pharisees who played with sleeves.
"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites, who strain out a gnat
and swallow a camel. Who tithe mint
and cumin, but neglect the fat
weightier matters of the Law,
justice, mercy, and faithfulness.
You whitewashed tombs, beautiful outside,
full of dead men's bones and ugliness."
This made enemies. And when he went
to Jerusalem for Passover,
rode in on a donkey to cheers,
overturned the money-changers' tables in Temple stover,
the authorities decided to act.
The high priest Caiaphas said
"it is better for one man to die
than for the whole nation to be red."
Judas Iscariot betrayed him
for thirty pieces of silver, paid.
He kissed him in the Garden of Gethsemane
and showed the soldiers where he stayed.
He was arrested, tried by the Sanhedrin,
tried by Pilate, tried by Herod Antipas,
sent back to Pilate, who washed his hands,
and let the crowd choose Barabbas instead.
The crowd chose Barabbas. Jesus was
scourged, crowned with thorns, made mocking king,
forced to carry his cross to Golgotha,
the place of the skull, the ugliest thing.
Crucifixion was the Roman method
for rebels, slaves, the lowest of men.
He hung with thieves on either side
for six hours, and then spoke seven "amens":
"Father, forgive them, they know not
what they do." "Today you shall be with me
in Paradise." "Woman, behold your son."
"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
"I thirst." "It is finished."
"Father, into your hands I commit
my spirit." And with these words he died.
The veil of the Temple was split.
Earthquake. Darkness. The centurion
who watched him die said "Truly this man
was the Son of God." They took him down
at sunset, before the Sabbath ran.
Joseph of Arimathea provided
a new tomb, cut in rock, nearby.
They wrapped him in linen with spices,
and rolled a stone, and said goodbye.
On the third day, the women came
to finish the anointing at dawn.
The stone was rolled away. The tomb
was empty. His body was gone.
Angels said "He is not here, he is risen."
Mary Magdalene met him in the garden
but did not recognize him at first.
He sent the twelve to make the kingdom's pardon
known to all nations, to baptize
in the name of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
teaching all he had commanded,
and he would be with them at the post
of every moment until the end.
Then he ascended to heaven's height,
with the promise that he would return
to judge the living and the dead in light.
This is the Christian claim, the core.
Not Jesus the teacher only. Not Jesus
the failed messiah, dead and done.
But Jesus who rose, and reigns, and frees us.
Whether the tomb was empty on that morning,
whether the post-Easter appearances
were objective or subjective vision,
whether what happened was what appears to us,
is the question that divides the ages.
The religion he launched would sweep the world.
The deflationary polytheist
sees what the crucial swerve unfurled:
a Jewish messianic sect went forth
into the Greco-Roman sea,
and merged with Sol Invictus worship,
with mystery religions, gradually,
and became the faith of Rome itself
three centuries later under Constantine.
But for now, a small community
in Jerusalem wondered what they had seen.
They met in upper rooms to pray.
They broke bread together and shared all things.
They waited for the return imminent.
And the spirit came on them on tongues' wings.
Stand.