Messiah

Many Jerusalem residents believe not only that the Messiah will return, but that his arrival is imminent--so imminent they have taken legal precautions to ensure they can return to Jerusalem immediately upon his return.

In apartment contracts around the city, there are clauses stipulating what will happen to the apartment if or when the Jewish Messiah comes. Using something called a “Messiah Clause,” the contracts stipulate that, in the event of the coming of the Moshiach, or Jewish redeemer, the lease “may be immediately terminated at the will of the landlord.” The owners, generally religious Jews living abroad, are concerned that he will arrive, build a third temple, and turn Israel into paradise--and they will be stuck waiting for their apartment tenants' contracts to run out before they can move back.

It is prophesied in the Jewish scriptures that there will be no more war, murder, or theft, the Jerusalem Temple will be rebuilt, and all the Jews will return to the land of Israel upon his arrival.

There is no count of how many leases in Jerusalem contain such a clause. But although not standard, the Messiah clause is requested enough that every Jerusalem property manager and real estate lawyer contacted by reporters had heard of it, and all except one had dealt with it firsthand.

The fact is, with only biblical prophecy and the conjecture of religious leaders upon which to rely for sketches of the next world, the level of zeal surrounding the associated legal and spiritual preparations is astonishing. Perhaps it’s all a safety net, just in case the scriptural forecast ends up being correct, but what a statement of faith, nonetheless.

The opinion among the property managers and real estate lawyers was unanimous that their clients would know the Messiah when they saw him. Sarah Eiferman, a real estate agent said, “When he comes, we’ll know. It’s in the Old Testament.”

Since 1939, Stan Lee created or co-created some of the world’s most popular superheroes. His super-human imagination gave birth to Black Panther, Spider-Man, the X-Men, Thor, Iron Man, the Fantastic Four, the Incredible Hulk, Daredevil, and Ant-Man, just to name a few.

Of course, the world has no shortage of storytellers, but Lee was something of a mutant in the field. The Avengers series alone has generated more than $10 billion in ticket sales at the box office since 2008. So, what set his stories apart from the rest? Lee was able to tap into deeply rooted human instincts.

He explains his secret in a 1984 interview with ET:

The whole formula … was to say: Let’s assume that somebody really could walk on walls like Spider-Man, or turn green and become a monster like The Hulk. That’s a given; we’ll accept that. But, accepting that, what would that person be like in the real world if he really existed? Wouldn’t he still have to worry about making a living? Or having acne and dandruff? Or his girlfriend jilting him? What are the real problems people would have? I think that’s what made the books popular.

We all know we need a superhero to rescue us from our enemies and from calamities. But we simultaneously want this hero to be someone with whom we can identify. There are two instincts woven into our fallen nature: the knowledge that we need someone to save us and the deep desire for another to understand our struggles. Lee was also well-known for his cameo appearances inside the stories he had written. Each film since X-Men in 2000 (until his death in 2018) has featured a brief incarnation of the author.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Stan Lee wasn’t the first to write himself into his storyline. Jesus did not simply rescue us from afar. He wrote himself into our story. He became a man and subjected himself to all the tyrannies of a fallen world.

In describing the incarnation Jill Carattini wrote:

Novelist Kurt Vonnegut once said of one of his most recurrent characters, “Kilgore was the only character I ever created who had enough imagination to suspect that he might be the creation of another human being. He said, ‘The way things are going, all I can think of is that I’m a character in a book by somebody who wants to write about somebody who suffers all the time.’”

In one scene Kilgore’s haunting suspicion is unveiled before him. Sitting content at a bar, he is suddenly overwhelmed by someone that has entered the room. Beginning to sweat, he becomes uncomfortably aware of a presence disturbingly greater than himself. The author himself, Kurt Vonnegut, has stepped beyond the role of narrator and into the book itself, and the effect is as bizarre for Kilgore as it is for the readers.

Vonnegut came to explain to Kilgore face-to-face that his life is all due to the pen and whims of an author who made it all up for his own sake. In this twisted ending, Kilgore is forced to conclude that apart from the imagination of the author he does not actually exist.

The gospels tell a story that is perhaps as fantastic as Vonnegut’s tale, though with consequences in stark contrast. The Gospel of John begins with a story that is interrupted by the presence of the author: “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. … All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. … And the word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a Father’s only son, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:1-15). The Word became one of us and moved into the neighborhood. But in this story, the presence of the author is not our demise but our inherent good.

In the 1960s Mary Ellen Rothrock was a grad student in English literature at the University of Wisconsin. In 1998 she wrote in Christian Reader magazine:

Despair seemed to permeate the student body, especially those in the humanities. A fellow graduate student summed it up cynically, "Playwright Samuel Becket is right. Man is just a piece of trash in a universe that's running down."

In college, atheism became my religion. Yet when I got into grad school, I found myself seeking to fill a spiritual void in my life. I began practicing Transcendental Meditation (TM). I met periodically with a TM supervisor. After a year or so of meditating, I mentioned that I had a recurring thought when I was trying to concentrate on my mantra. ‘It's a line from Handel's Messiah. Something in my mind keeps repeating “And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed.”

To my young mind, not only was the music thrilling, but the words seemed to come from beyond this world. I loved the joyful language: ‘Hallelujah! for the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth. ... For unto us a Child is born … And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.;”

Her TM supervisor told her to ignore the words that kept coming to her but “I told myself, ‘These aren't just random thoughts.’ It suddenly hit me. The phrase And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed was an invitation from a personal God of glory to seek him! Why couldn't he be ‘Wonderful, Counselor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace?’

Within months, she met a woman who explained how she could have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. She said, “As I heard the words from the Bible, the words from the musical score made sense. The Holy Spirit convinced me of the truth: the God I'd hungered for, the personal God, loved me. ‘Hallelujah! For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth.’”

Christian leader and writer Russell Moore recently overheard a young man complaining how much he disliked Christmas. But his anti-Christmas mood wasn’t centered on holiday stress; it was all about the music. At first Moore thought he was in the presence of the Grinch, until the young man explained why he found the music so bad. “Christmas [music] is boring because there’s no narrative tension,” he said.

Russell Moore commented:

For him, the [shallow] lyrics of our Christmas songs couldn’t encompass [the world’s heartache]. Simeon the prophet never wished anyone a “holly-jolly Christmas” or envisioned anything about chestnuts roasting on an open fire. We ought to make sure that what we sing measures up with the “narrative tension” of the Christmas story.

In a time when we seem to learn of a new tragedy each day, the unbearable lightness of Christmas seems absurd to the watching world. But, even in the best of times, we all know that we live in a groaning universe. Just as we sing with joy about the coming of the Promised One, we ought also to sing with groaning that he is not back yet (Rom. 8:23), sometimes with groanings too deep for lyrics.

We have a rich and complicated and often appropriately dark Christmas hymnody. We can sing of blessings flowing “far as the curse is found,” of the one who came to “free us all from Satan’s power.” Let’s sing that, every now and then, where we can be overheard.

In October of 2012, the Opera Company of Philadelphia brought together over 650 choristers to perform a Random Act of Culture in the heart of a busy Macy’s store in Philadelphia. Accom­panied by the largest pipe organ in the world the Opera Company infiltrated the store as shoppers, and burst into a rendition of the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel’s “Messiah” at high noon.

The reactions on the faces of shoppers and salespeople are worth the YouTube visit —which has been replayed over 9 million times. People with shopping bags stop to raise their hands. Phones are pulled out of pockets and purses to record the moment. The busywork of a crowded mall in action otherwise stopped in its tracks by words that make it all seem so small.

And He shall reign forever and ever, Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

The most posted comment after the replaying of this random act of culture is the presence of teary eyes and tingling spines. “Just beautiful!” said one. “Moving beyond words.” “It brought tears to my eyes.” “It gave me goosebumps.”

Noticeably absent from all this commentary was reaction from those who seem to find something wrong with anything Christian in the public arena. “I’m an atheist, and I approve of this random act,” writes one responder with a smiley face. “I’m Hindu and I tearfully agree!” another replied.

Handel and the art that still stirs imagination and gratitude were inseparably inspired by the story of a God who comes near—the Good, the True, and the Beautiful in Spirit, embodied, in Person. Hallelujah indeed!

In March 2002, the former ruler of Afghanistan, the 87-year-old Mohammed Zahir Shah, returned to his homeland after 30 years of exile. Here's how an article in the Chicago Tribune described his grand and glorious welcome:

On Thursday, thousands of invited guests lined up for hours at the airport and people gathered on the streets leading to a refurbished seven-bedroom villa to see the former ruler. Delegations arrived from across Afghanistan's 32 provinces. Governors and their advisers, members of women's groups carrying posters of the king, most of the interim administration, royalists, warlords, men in turbans and others in suits all converged on the pockmarked runway where shells of bombed airplanes lay. Two red carpets were laid out. The newly trained honor guard was on hand, and young women and children in traditional embroidered dress greeted Zahir Shah with flowers and poems.

I hope you're thinking of the contrast when Israel's Messiah was born, when he came to his own people.

In his everyday life, Charles Foster is a respected veterinarian, a practicing lawyer, and a teacher at Oxford University in England. But as noted in his book Being a Beast, Foster also has an unusual practice. Every so often Foster tries to live like a badger. Yes, like one of those dark-dwelling, tunnel-making, rodent and worm-eating mammals. Usually he does this alone, though for a few days he went with his eight-year-old son, Tom. On a friend's farm, they made a human-sized badger home, a 15-feet long hole that they would sleep in. Charles says he's probably spent six weeks living underground like this over the years, sleeping during the day, awake at night like real badgers.

For Foster the main part of living like a badger involves getting low to the ground, crawling around on his hands and knees. He also blindfolds his eyes (because badgers' eyesight is terrible) and eats earthworms (since 85 percent of a badger's diet consists of worms).

Now as strange and even repugnant as this sounds, think of something even stranger and potentially more repugnant—the God of all creation who exists in perfect beauty and splendor becoming a human being and living on our fallen planet—and there was no escape for a full human lifetime. Jesus Christ came to us not just as an interesting nature experiment. Nor was he repulsed by us. He came out of love to rescue us from our sin.

London witnessed a spectacular scene when a giant wooden replica of the city ignited and burned brilliantly to the ground. The conflagration was planned, however, in honor of the 350th anniversary of the Great Fire of London. The original fire began on September 2, 1666, in the early morning at a bakery on Pudding Lane. The surrounding structures were soon engulfed, and the fire spread to the rest of the city, lasting four entire days. The modern-day festival to remember the disaster is known as "London's Burning" and contains four days of free art events, concluding this year with the grand burning of the replica of medieval London.

At first glance, it seems a bit odd to celebrate such a catastrophe-especially with another fire. However, as gruesome as the Great Fire may have been, it now has its place firmly etched into the city's history as a turning point: the beginning of a time of regrowth and resurgence for London.

Christians arguably perform the same "odd" type of ritual when we take communion and decorate our homes and sacred buildings with crosses. We not only commemorate the brutal murder of Jesus, but we adorn our worship with the murder weapon: the cross, one of the most widely known torture devices of that time period. And yet it doesn't seem strange to us—because we know that what Satan intended to be the ultimate act of evil, God turned around to be the ultimate act of love.

Potential Preaching Angles: Redemption; Cross; Crucifixion; Easter; Communion

David C. Nicosia, a business owner in Chicago, had no idea who he was slapping. The 55-year-old man was outside the Cook County Courthouse when he became angry at a 79-year-old African-American woman. After arguing with her, Nicosia, who is white, spat on the woman and called her "Rosa Parks." Then he turned and allegedly slapped the silver-haired woman on the left side of her face with an open hand.

It was a bad move for Nicosia. The woman happened to be Judge Arnette Hubbard, the first female president of the National Bar Association and Cook County Bar Association. Judge Hubbard is a community icon who has served as an election observer in Haiti and South Africa and had long been a voice on civil rights and women's issues. Hubbard was appointed to the bench in 1997, re-elected to a six-year term the following year and retained since in two more elections, most recently in 2010.

Nicosia was arrested by sheriff's deputies and charged with four counts of aggravated battery and a hate crime. The Chicago Tribune quoted a local leader who said, "People of good common sense and decency, people of good hearts should be outraged by this." After all, nobody should go slapping and spitting on a community icon.

Preaching Angles: Holy Week; Christ, cross of; Cross—In the Gospels we see that the entire human race conspired to slap and spit on someone whose true dignity was also hidden. It was an outrage, and yet the eternal Son of God didn't arrest us. He set us free.

In the midst of her "Mrs. Carter Show" world tour, the singer Beyonce has made it very explicit what she expects from her hosts. The Daily Star reportedly scooped up a copy of the list, which included the following demands:

• All crew members must wear 100 percent cotton clothing.
• Alkaline water must be chilled to 21 degrees and served with $900 titanium straws.
• Bathrooms must have new toilet seats and red toilet paper at every venue.
• Hand-carved ice balls should be made after each show to cool her throat.
• Newly refurbished, luxury dressing rooms with enough space that's typically used to accommodate entire sports teams.

Of course Beyonce isn't the only famous or wealthy person (or ordinary person like us) who makes outlandish requests. In sharp contrast, when Jesus came to earth, he demanded nothing—except for a cattle stall. A Christian from the 4th century (Theodotus of Ancyra) explained it like this: In the Incarnation, God "chose surroundings that were poor and simple, so ordinary as to be almost unnoticed, so that people would know it was the Godhead alone that had changed the world."

In an issue of Christianity Today, a Muslim man describes his commitment to follow Isa al Masih, Jesus the Messiah. Suprisingly, a rather "ordinary" miracle caused this man to open his heart to Jesus. Here's how he described the miracle:

One night the only food my wife and I had was a small portion of macaroni. My wife prepared it very nicely. Then one of her friends knocked on the door. I told myself, The macaroni is not sufficient for even the two of us, so how will it be enough for three of us? But because we have no other custom, we opened the door, and she came in to eat with us.

While we were eating, the macaroni started to multiply; it became full in the bowl. I suspected that something was wrong with my eyes, so I started rubbing them. I thought maybe my wife hid some macaroni under the small table, so I checked, but there was nothing. My wife and I looked at each other, but because the guest was there we said nothing.

Afterward I lay down on the bed, and as I slept, Isa came to me and asked me, "Do you know who multiplied the macaroni?" I said, "I don't know." He said, "I am Isa al Masih [Jesus, the Messiah]. If you follow me, not only the macaroni but your life will be multiplied."

The Jewish magazine Moment asked a number of Jewish writers, professors, rabbis, artists, and actors the following question: "What does the concept of the Messiah mean today?" Here are some of the responses:

• Amoz Oz, novelist: "He may be around the corner, but that's where he should always be …. In the Jewish tradition … sitting idly waiting for the Messiah is a sin."
• Rabbi Peter H. Schweitzer: "Years ago, a popular evangelical bumper sticker read, "I found it." The Jewish version would read, "I'm still looking for it."
• Harris Lenowitz, literature professor: "Who at different times in their life hasn't had a belief … that someone, a messiah, can help them and help the world? And the messiah is the biggest answer to the biggest single question: 'Does God care about me?'"
• Lucette Lagnado, reporter: "People have stopped believing in God, in the possibility of miracles, in the mystical, and in that most mystical belief of all—the idea that somebody's going to come along and make the world all better. I think that's a sad development of the modern world."
• Deb Margolin, playwright and professor: "Most people think the Messiah has already come, but Jews are waiting. It could be anybody …. It's a very sexy idea. There's a blind date with the sacred that awaits you at any moment."
• Ruth Messinger, CEO of Jewish World Service: "The Messiah doesn't connote that some entity, deity or event will suddenly arrive and change the circumstances in our lives …. That's a notion of childhood wish fulfillment."
• Jack Dann, science fiction writer: "Twenty years ago I would have said that the idea of a messianic message was dying out in the popular culture, that it was being overtaken by a more sophisticated secularism. Obviously I was mistaken. More and more people seem to be embracing the idea that a messiah will appear to fix everything."
• Mayim Bialik, neuroscientist and actress: "The concept of a messiah is a general … notion that we are partners in making the world better, in moving the world forward. The Messiah is progress, participation, suiting up and showing up for life."
• Samuel Heilman, sociology professor: "For most Jews, the messianic idea has receded; it's not on the top of the agenda, and they don't see history as inexorably moving to that day."

Possible Preaching Angles: (1) Use these quotes to set up a sermon on evangelism, especially with our Jewish friends. There is a huge difference between Christianity and Judaism—Jews are still waiting for the Messiah (or some of them have given up on the Messiah), while Christians believe that the Messiah has come and is still alive. (2) You could also use these quotes to illustrate the character of Christian hope: Christ has come; Christ is alive; Christ will come again. (3) Use these quotes when preaching on Jesus as Christ and Messiah.