There was an inscription on the inner wall of the temple forbidding any other than a Jew to pass inside on the pain of death. Jewish midwives were forbidden to aid any woman but a Jew lest they were responsible for bringing another gentile into the world. Once we begin to grasp the incredible depth of enmity between Jews and the surrounding nations we gain a much clearer picture of the revolutionary Jesus and one of the reasons He was so hated by the establishment. Not only did He feed 5000 Jews in Galilee, He also feed 4000 gentiles on the east side of the Jordan. He healed the child of a Canaanite woman. He asked a Samaritan woman for a drink. He healed a Roman’s servant. This was way beyond eating with publicans. At least publicans were Jews. I am often amused that conservative Christians seem to think they have a monopoly on Jesus’ values. It was the conservatives who killed Him. Jesus was a radical.
The Gospel of Matthew closes with a message so radical that it took years before the disciples began to heed to it. “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: . . .” Peter had to have a special vision of the animals in the sheet before he would accept an invitation to a Roman’s home. (Acts 10) After Saul was knocked off his horse and became Paul he still needed years of prayer and visions before he was up to taking the Gospel to the gentiles.
Dare I say, can I be brave enough to venture, that until we see beyond our “kind” we are not yet like Jesus?
Written by Roger Bothwell on March 6, 2012
Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574
Rogerbothwell.org