Who Do You Say That I Am? The Disturbing Jesus We Need

The Question at the Heart of the Gospel

Here we are today in the middle of Matthew's Gospel, climbing a great big mountain toward the moment of great revelation with the transfiguration that lies ahead. This is a really crucial passage where Jesus engages his disciples and asks the question: "Who am I? What do you see? How do you make sense of who I am and what I'm doing amongst the people who gather and respond, who are healed and listen?"

Simon Peter responds with a number of suggestions about who Jesus might be, and then finally he confesses: "You are the Messiah." That's a very important word for the very Jewish community that makes up the Gospel of Matthew's audience. Jewish people are looking for the Messiah — the one who will come, who will save them from all their worries, solve the political situation, make their lives happier and more secure. Whatever it is they're looking for, they're looking for a Messiah.

And Jesus responds affirmatively that he is the one they have been looking for — but don't tell anyone else.

The Teddy Bear God We Prefer

Who is Jesus? What would Jesus look like? How would we mark the actions of Jesus in the life of our community? It's a big question for each one of us and for the community of faith we belong to.

I kind of think from time to time we would prefer Jesus to be a quiet person who sits in the third back row of our community and behaves themselves — someone who's always a source of comfort and kindness. Well, kind of like a teddy bear. I have a little teddy bear I was given when I was born. It reminds me of God in some ways. I would love God to be like this teddy bear and not this troublemaker and disturber like Jesus is.

Jesus is always taking us out to the edge, outside the door, engaging us with people who are other — other faiths, other cultures — and asking us to respond with grace. Jesus is not a comfortable figure at all.

Jesus Returns to the Land

The most profound way I live with that sense of being pulled out to the edge is that I have surrounded myself with artworks that give me a view of the way in which Jesus might be other.

The first is a painting by Shirley Purdie, an Aboriginal artist from the Kimberley region. In this work, she shows the ascension of Jesus — where Jesus goes after his death. The figure of Jesus is in the middle, people gathered around, and he looks like he's about to go up into a cloud and then into this grand gesture of blackness. The work is actually made of the soil that Shirley Purdie and her family are responsible for. She's gone out and mined this substance, mixed it with glue, and placed it on canvas. It's all rough, like a biscuity surface. What we're looking at is not only Jesus, but the land.

Where does Jesus go when Jesus ascends? He goes back into the land. This is the cosmology and probably the insight of indigenous people. There's no heaven pictured amongst pretty pink clouds — that's not realistic. Jesus returns back into the land and carries the memory, the connection of what is sacred.

How do I understand the sacredness of land? The things that make up my life, the materiality, the things I touch with my fingers. Here is a Jesus who's challenging me to the very edges of my awareness of the ground I walk on.

Jesus with a Hammer

The second image is by Emmanuel Garibay from the Philippines — a country that is very Christian but has also been torn apart by political foment and corruption. There are people who are powerful, who have all the money, and most of the population are poor. Where is Jesus? How is Jesus active? How would we recognize Jesus in this culture?

Emmanuel offers us a very confronting image of a Jesus who is holding a hammer and some nails. One wonders whether he's got down off the cross himself and pulled out the nails, and he's got this look on his face — not quite retribution, but rather severe. He's going to put things right.

Here is a Jesus who's concerned about those who have suffered, those who've been pushed to the margins, and he is going to do something about it. That's disturbing. That's someone who gets involved in politics and social concerns and is worried about those who are the victims of the way in which we assume life to be. It's a troubling image to have on my wall.

Blessed Are the Peacemakers

And then finally, a drawing by George Gittoes, a very famous Australian artist who drew this after visiting Rwanda and being involved in the civil war there. He observed a young man helping young children in the middle of a violent massacre scene. George was shocked to come down the pathway and find this man reading the Beatitudes:

"Blessed are you, the peacemakers."

Here was this Christ figure that Gittoes identifies in the middle of the most horrifying situation one could imagine. Presumably, this young man who held his Bible and spoke the words of Jesus lost his life because he put himself in between the soldiers and the young children gathered around.

Expanding Our Horizons

As I think about the question that Jesus poses to his disciples — Who am I? Who do people say that I am? What do you see? What do you understand of the work and life of Jesus in this very moment of existence? — having these works on the wall of my study and my home reminds me to expand my own personal horizons.

Not to stay comfortable with my teddy bear, but to step outside the comfortable doors and boundaries of my life and to be reminded that Jesus is the disturber, the conjurer, the trickster, the stranger, the angel — all of those things that expand our sense of being in the world.

And I find God meets me there.