As Jesus was arrested Peter attacked the High Priest’s servant. Jesus rebuked him stating that if He desired it, He could have brought a host of flaming angels to incinerate His enemies. At the climax of His ministry, when all history was brought to its central point, the Gospels remind us that Jesus was the commander of the angel armies.
The thought might dawn upon us that if Jesus had simply made use of this power earlier He could’ve really made a better impression. After all, if you were picking teams which would you choose? The group consisting of a few fishermen, an IRS agent, and a some guys with eyebrow-raising background checks? Or hosts of angels who move like lightning and whose appearance knocks people flat on their face?
But Jesus came to redeem people. People like you. People who walk on the dirt they came from and to which they are going. People who skin their knees, and shed their tears, and eat their food. Our worship service comes to its conclusion in a way that might seem rather materialistic. We bring an offering box full of checks, crumpled bills, and the nickels & dimes of 7 year olds chore money. We eat some rather ordinary bread. We drink a small cup of wine, and it isn’t even the sort of wine that impresses snooty elites. We sing and lift these hands that will soon toss a baseball or a salad or a toddler, in different ways of course.
Jesus died in order to destroy the old world and create a new one. Not an immaterial world, but a resurrected one. This meal is for pilgrims marching in faith to that everlasting world to come. We open our Bibles, lift our hands, sing aloud, drop currency in the tithe box, and savor real bread and wine, not despite but because we are born again.
So, come in faith and welcome to Jesus Christ…
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