The forerunner of Christ
11:2 When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples
11:3 and said to him, "Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?"
11:4 Jesus answered them, "Go and tell John what you hear and see:
11:5 the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, those with a skin disease are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.
11:6 And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me."
11:7 As they went away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John: "What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind?
11:8 What, then, did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes? Look, those who wear soft robes are in royal palaces.
11:9 What, then, did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet.
11:10 This is the one about whom it is written, 'See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you.'
11:11 "Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist, yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.
It's reversals all the way down. And the apocalypse of the eschaton. All in a few verses.I’m at risk of overstating the concept of the reversal. It’s supposed to be reserved for cosmic, or at least nation changing events, like Isaiah’s holy mountain vision, or Ezekiel’s vision of the valley of dry bones, or God’s throne chariot. But the reversal of individual physical conditions is exactly what Isaiah promised from God, and Jesus throws in the foundational principle of the basileia tou theou for good measure: the first shall be last, and the first of all last and servant of all.
And for the cherry on the sundae, this is Jesus’ way of saying: “Fuck this shit.”
Look at verse 5. Jesus tells the disciples of John that everything is being undone, that God’s justice is being brought to the broken, the marginalized, the discarded and rejected. Lepers are healed, the blind see, the deaf hear. People literally blamed for their conditions and cast aside as “unclean,” are the first to receive God’s good news. Not the “blessed,” not the “worthy,” not the rich or the “best and the brightest,” but the invisible, the ptochoi, the ones with nothing and with no worth in society.
Fuck this shit. Time to do something about it. And then Jesus asks why they went to the wilderness to see John, and Isaiah is evoked again. What was a guy in the wilderness worth to society, after all? Isaiah tells his audience to give hope to the broken as a way of preparing them for the restoration that is to come. Jesus tells them “You went out to see a prophet of God,” which is to say someone speaking God’s truth. Now see that truth in action. But the truth is not a triumph; it’s a paradox. It’s that paradox we celebrate every year at Christmas.
In Luke’s nativity, the angels tell the shepherds “This will be a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.” Not much of a sign of identification. Kind of like saying “You will find a newborn at the maternity ward, in the nursery.” But that’s not the “sign.” The sign is that the savior, is a helpless child. The sign is the paradox: “God with us”starts out as helpless and in need of others, as all of us. And what was John preaching, except that we need to take care of each other? In Matthew!s story, that child faces danger from the government from the beginning. The Holy Family has to flee into Egypt to escape Herod’s massacre. When they come back after Herod’s death, they return to Nazareth, not Bethlehem, just to be sure it’s safe. God is powerless. God is at risk. From the beginning, we face the paradox of the power of powerlessness. And now the adult Jesus is telling us the least in the basileia tou theou is greater than John.
Because the first will be last, and the last first, and the first of all, the last and servant of all. Thanks be to God, because otherwise the basileia tou theou would just be the old world order over again, and what’s the point of that?
What’s the point of going to the wilderness, or going to the manger, if the world is already going to be there, its order and authority just reaffirmed? Surely a revelation is at hand! But it can’t be a revelation that the new boss is the same as the old boss; because what revelation is that? Fuck this shit! Where’s the justice? Where’s Mary’s vision?
Without the paradox, what’s the point?
But with the paradox? Ah! Thanks be to God for that!
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