Stirred up for Jesus
Then Pilate announced to the chief priests and the crowd, “I find no basis for a charge against this man.” But they insisted, “He stirs up people all over Judea by his teaching. He started in Galilee and has come all the way here.” Luke 23:4-5
They weren’t wrong, you know. Jesus was stirring people up. He wasn’t doing exactly that of which they accused him, but they were right in a way. They were accusing him of inciting the people to rebellion. They were accusing him of seeking to overturn the rule of Pilate and of Ceasar. They accused him of being a disturber of the peace and setting up a kingdom that would rival the Romans. And if that were true - the way that they meant it - then Jesus would certainly have been guilty as charged, guilty of the cross, guilty of rebellion, and worthy of death.
But they still weren’t wrong. They just didn’t really understand how Jesus was stirring people up. Consider how the ministry and message stirred up the hearts of people.
He stirred up their hearts by overturning their religious/cultural norms. That was what got the Pharisees and teachers of the law so worked up against Jesus in the first place. His Word was challenging their rules, and they hated that idea. He was calling them to abandon their pursuit of self-justification in favor of Jesus-justification. But we all do that. We all want to claim a righteousness of our own. That’s why we get so worked up when people call us out on our sins. They’re proving that we’re not, which stirs up the inner lawyer in us to a stiff response.
In the hearts of others a yearning to hear His Word and to see what Jesus would do next. They had a deep yearning to hear what Jesus had to say. That’s why the Jews couldn’t carry out what they really wanted to do. The people who thronged around Jesus were hanging on his words (cf. Luke 19:48). They were eager to hear what he had to say and receive the gifts he had to give. They had abandoned their pursuit of self-righteousness and were eager to receive righteousness, that is, by grace and through the cross of Jesus. They were eager to hear what Jesus had to see and hung on every word of his. He stirs us up to a yearning for his Word, hanging with bated breath on every syllable that dropped from his lips.
He was (and is) also stirring up a radical love in our hearts for the people around us, the kind of love that puts other people ahead of us. As Jesus sat with his disciples around the Table, he taught them about a love that puts other people in our place. Yes, that’s what I meant to say. We have seats at the Table with Jesus. With the disciples, Jesus has given us a place in his kingdom and a place at the Table. And Jesus is among us as one who serves. So, Jesus stirs us up to give people our seat at the Table, to be their servants, and to be among people not as people at the Table but as one who serves (Lk 22:24-30). He stirs us up to radical love.
And most of all, he stirs up in us a deep yearning and longing for a kingdom that is not of this world. That’s why Jesus was not a threat to Pilate, Ceasar, or the Romans. He wasn’t trying to set up a throne in Jerusalem and rule from there. He was bringing us into a kingdom that is not of this world. On the one hand, we are already citizens of that kingdom. That’s why we are stirred up to a deep love for others and a strong desire to do what pleases our king. We have seats at his table and receive eternal gifts from his hand. We are already citizens of that kingdom, an island of salt and light in this world. And at the same time, we are not yet there in this kingdom. That’s what the thief longed for from the cross. “Remember me,” he pleaded, “when you come into your kingdom.” We will be welcomed into that kingdom one day by the power and mercy of Jesus. Yes, Jesus stirs up in a deep yearning for his kingdom.
The word of Jesus incites us to something, but not to rebellion.
It stirs us up to radical love and hope that yearns.
Prayer: Lord Jesus, keep messing with me through your word so that I love radically and hope for a kingdom that is yet to be seen. Amen.