← Ask NT Wright Anything
Ask NT Wright Anything
Where do Christians go when they die? Jesus kept healing on the Sabbath? And is 'faith' enough?
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Morning decisions.
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How about a creamy mocha Frappuccino drink? Or sweet vanilla smooth caramel maybe?
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Or white chocolate mocha? Whichever you choose, delicious coffee awaits.
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Find Starbucks Frappuccino drinks wherever you buy your groceries.
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Hello and welcome to another episode of Ask NT Ride Anything, the program where we try to answer your questions about Jesus, the Bible, and the life of of faith. I'm Mike Bird from Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia, and I'm joined by Tom
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Wright from Wliff hall in Oxford.
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Tom, we've got a great lineup of questions this week about the power of group faith. You know, the difficulty of explaining the death of a believer. You know, Jesus's healings on the Sabbath. Tom, have you ever been part of a group? Maybe it was a small group, maybe was a clergy cohort, maybe it was a church where you felt that the people's faith there was particularly powerful and having a powerful effect on each other and maybe even on the surrounding community. Have you ever had that kind of experience?
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Yes, I have. I'm not sure I would describe it in quite those terms, but certainly, I mean, you know, for me, Christian faith from the beginning was not just an individual thing, though of course the individual mattered, but was shared by this whole group, even though that that caused problems from time to time. Something that we all believe we are part of this team. And the whole notion of corporate belief is one that I think many Western Christians have shied away from because it seems to pull away from the importance of the individual. But I don't think it does that at all. I think it sets a context within which people find they can believe because here we all are together and because we love one another and we're working together, it kind of makes sense. So, yes, I have been part of groups like that.
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Oh, great. Well, the reason I ask is because our first question is from Ronald Kretschmer of Yelm. It's about the power of group faith. And this is what he writes to us in Matthew 9, some friends bring a paralytic to Jesus. It says that Jesus saw their faith, but then he tells the paralytic specifically that his sins are forgiven. I'm very curious why the group's faith is noted, but it's just the individual who has his sins forgiven and then also healed. Thank you very much. I enjoyed hearing you speak in Seattle this year. So there you go, Tom, someone who's impressed with you both on the podcast and in person. But Tom, what's happening here in Matthew 9? I think the parallels in Mark 2 as well, what is their faith that is so strong and compelling them to bring this poor man to Jesus, but only his sins get forgiven?
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Yeah, well, I don't think it implies that the people who brought him didn't have any sins that needed forgiven. I think it's rather a focus that Jesus sees that part of the man's problem, the man who's carried on the stretcher, is a paralysis at several levels. I mean, I don't want to go sort of too psychosomatic on this, but it may well be that Jesus could see to the heart of his problem and could see that there may well have been a specific physical ailment and paralysis. That part of it was an awareness of the burden of sin or something like that. And the idea of forgiveness of sins being a release from everything that is binding you is so powerful in scripture as a whole that it seems to me that's quite a natural focus. And I think we in the modern west tend to want to be too individualistic. So whose faith is it exactly? And so on. And I don't think anyone in the ancient world would have worried about that. It's a context of faith that these friends have said, here's this man Jesus, he seems to be healing people in ways that nobody had thought possible before. Let's just get on and bring our friend here to Jesus. And that faith, I mean the meaning of the word faith, there is their trust that Jesus is able to solve whatever the problem is. And so if the problem includes the fact that this friend may be burdened with sin, or maybe in his paralysis he was imagining that maybe God was cross with him for some reason and that's why he's paralyzed. We just don't know any of that. This is sort of modern style speculation, but Jesus slices through all that. And you know, my child, your sins are forgiven. Which is a wonderful declaration of liberty, of liberation, as in the whole post exilic thing, that Israel comes back from exile because God has dealt with the sins which took her there, she's received from the Lord's hand double for her sins, as it says Isaiah 40, verse 1. And therefore the whole context is of faith recognizing that here in Jesus is the fulfillment of those large purposes for God's people. So I think to worry about whether it's an individual or corporate really is by and large missing the point. And one shouldn't deduce from that that therefore individual faith doesn't matter. Of course not. But rather that God can do all sorts of things when people get together and Trust him and act on that trust.
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Yeah, that's the point. I would take away that people tend to come together in faith. They approach Jesus in faith as a group, you know, praying, leaning into the grace of God in Christ Jesus about some of the things that. That can be done for us. Yeah, I think that's. That's a great way to explain it. Hopefully we've answered your question there, Ronald. Let's move to our second question. And this is a little bit different, and this is certainly a different tone as well. Manfred Heck from Medina, Ohio. He's got a question about explaining the passing of a believer. What's the best language to use? And this is what he asks. Good day, gentlemen. Thank you for thoughtfully responding to listener questions. Here's mine. I just finished reading Tom's latest book, God's Homecoming. Having grown up in predominantly dispensational churches, focused largely on how to get to heaven and bring others with you, there was some comfort knowing that when believers passed away, they are in heaven and now. So rather than using that language, what's a more biblical, more accurate way to explain to kids, for example, when their grandmother has died? I think after reading the book, my answer would be that, you know, the grandmother went to be in the presence of Jesus, awaiting resurrection into a new body, where our great hope is that upon the final renewal of all things, we'll see her again in a perfected, reunited new heavens and new earth. Although went to heaven was a lot simpler. So, Tom, what do you have to say to Manfred? Because, you know, at the one hand, I think he's right. Just saying that, you know, our dear departed, saintly grandmother is in heaven is a lot easier. People can relate to that. But to say that she's, you know, with Jesus awaiting the resurrection body marriage of heaven on earth. It's a bit wordy. It's a bit wordy, but how would you put it? I mean, because. And this is. This is where the. The theological program you've developed really does touch the road of human experience and some of the most darkest and despondent moments of human life in the stages of grief.
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Yeah, absolutely. And our correspondent has obviously read my book quite carefully because the last chapter of that book is indeed all about how we address this question of the intermediate state, as often been called, and I have talked to friends about this, in terms of whether one can still say that so and so is in heaven. And the general consensus among people who have read the Bible the same way that I now do is that that's misleading. Because people in our society in general have this picture of dying and going to heaven, which is basically the picture given to them by the Greek philosophy of Plato and others. And that's why it seems so simple and obvious, because it's woven into our culture, our west culture has learned to think Platonically. And so to push back against that is always going to be difficult. And people say, well, what do you mean? So are they really in heaven? And the answer is, well, yeah, but that's not how the Bible ever puts it, which is that that's a kind of a red flag for me if we say, here's the answer, and then we go looking for passages. And guess what? The Bible doesn't say that. Of course, people take phrases like eternal life to mean, oh, well, that's obviously heaven, but it's not like that. Eternal life is the age to come of Jewish expectation. And part of the point of the New Testament is that the age to come has broken in with Jesus, but is yet to be completed when he comes again. So there is an interim time both in history between Jesus resurrection and. And when God will be all in all. That's 1 Corinthians 15, 15, 20, 28. And the interim time is also for us as individuals, that when we die, we go to be, as Paul says in Philippians 1, we go to be with the Messiah, which is far better. That's a wonderfully consoling and comforting statement that we go to be with Jesus and that's the best possible place to be. And I would also add that when Jesus is talking with the Sadducees in that fascinating. In the Synoptic Gospels, he says, in proof of the fact that the resurrection is going to be a reality, he says when God speaks to Moses, he says, I'm the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And Jesus says he is God, not of the dead, but of the living, because all live to him. In other words, putting these two together, this person is alive to God and in the nearer presence of Jesus. And then what I have done in that chapter, the last chapter in God's homecoming, is to add that this is sustained for us by the Holy Spirit, that the Spirit does the job, which in traditional formulations regularly ascribed to the soul. The New Testament does not use the word soul in that context, except for those two very odd passages in Revelation about the souls under the altar. I don't think that's an exception at all, really. It's just Revelation uses that kind of imagery from time to time. So that I think to be able to say that God's spirit has indwelt your grandmother and that God's spirit is taking her now in into the presence of Jesus Christ where she is alive to God and that God the Father, the Son and the Spirit will in the end make a whole new world, new creation, new heavens and new earth, and raise us and our beloved grandmother from the dead. Now, wouldn't it be nice if our churches were all able to teach that so clearly during the regular course of teaching ministry that it became easier to refer to it at a funeral or whatever? We're not there yet. God willing, we might be able to make some steps towards that.
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Yeah. This goes to show where biblical eschatology and pastoral theology needs to be brought together. One of the phrases I like to use is from Colossians is to say that, you know, when saints leave us, we can say that their life is hid in Christ. And I think that captures something of the mystery of what it is being in that intermediate state of head of the resurrection, but doesn't mean we're leaning into those strange tropes and ideas of, you know, being in heaven when you die. So I mean, that's, that's how I do it.
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Yeah, yeah. And, and I mean, there have been various theories down the years and we can see in the New Testament some of the Judean teachers of the time. For instance, when the Pharisees are arguing about what sort of an experience Paul has had in Acts 23, they say supposing an angel or a spir spoke to him. In other words, they don't believe that Paul has actually met somebody who's genuinely bodily alive. Again, they're wondering if it's somebody in the intermediate state. And they're using, well, maybe that's like an angel, maybe that's like a spirit. And I would say from Romans 8 and from 1 Corinthians 2 and 6, it is the blending together of the Holy Spirit with our Spirit and that, that is what provides the continuity with the Holy Spirit holding us in life in the presence of Christ and being alive to God.
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And we should also add, you've got a good little book on this topic, I believe, called for all the Saints. Is that right, Tom?
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Yeah, I wrote that book 23 years ago. I think because I was fed up with the way that my church, the Church of England, was leaning towards more and more commemoration of so called All Souls Day, the day after All Saints Day. All Saints Day is of course should be the big one when all the saints, All God's holy people from time immemorial who now from their labors rest. We celebrate them and look forward to being raised with them to new life. But my church has drifted away from that and then focuses on all souls as though there are all these souls, people have died who aren't yet saints who aren't yet in heaven. And so in this rather gray intermediate state, we're rather gloomy about them. And it's a way of having a kind of watered down Anglican theology of purgatory. And, and just everything about that sticks in my throat. And I just think that that's not the way the Bible sees it.
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True. True, Tom. Well, we're going to take a break and when we come back, we're going to look at Jesus and some of the Sabbath controversy stories in the Gospels. Back in a moment.
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Welcome back everyone. We've got our third and final question for today from Elaine Barton from Medford, Oregon. And she's got a question about Jesus's healings on the Sabbath. And Elaine says hello, Doctors Wright and Bird, and thank you for the podcast. My question is about John's Gospel of Jesus miracles. John includes some that also appear in the Synoptic Gospels and some that are unique. What I have noticed though, is that John makes specific mention of several healing miracles that occurred on the Sabbath. In fact, it seems that every healing mentioned by John is said to be on the Sabbath. What do you think is John's purpose? Is he trying to teach us something about the Sabbath, about the work or power of Jesus or something else? Much thanks in advance. Well, Elaine has hit the nail on the head. There are some powerful stories of healings in John's Gospel, particularly in John chapter, I think five, and John chapter nine, and they all have a climax of controversy. And does Jesus have the authority to do these things on the Sabbath? So, Tom, what do you have to say to Elaine about these stories of Jesus healing on the Sabbath?
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Yeah, that's a great point. And I'm glad that Elaine has raised this because I think in John's Gospel particularly, there are two lines running in parallel, because in the Judean world, heaven and earth came together in, in the Temple in Jerusalem. And John makes it clear all the way through his Gospel that Jesus is the reality to which the temple was pointing. So that's in terms of space. That holy space, if you like, is no longer going to be this big building in the middle of Jerusalem. Holy space is where Jesus is and where his people are with him. But then the same is true of time, because the point about the Sabbath was not that it was a funny old law which Moses laid down, or actually it goes back to Genesis 1, of course, and which the Jews then became more and more legalistic about. And then because Jesus didn't like legalism, he kind of sliced through it and deliberately did things which would provoke people. That's a very low grade and very modern Western way of reading the stories about the Sabbath healings. Rather, I think what we see in the Sabbath is the intersection of the age to come and the present age. The evidence for people reading it like that is mostly a bit later than the time of Jesus. But like a lot of rabbinic traditions, they pretty surely go back to the time of Jesus and probably earlier, with the idea being that God has promised that one day the, the present age will give way to the age to come in which all the prophecies will be fulfilled, all the world will be full of justice and peace, everything will be sorted out at last. And then the Sabbath is a way of saying, you get to enjoy this once a week. And that's what the Sabbath is. Every week you have a day where you're anticipating the age to come. So that as one of the later rabbis put it, on the Sabbath you shouldn't even kill a fly. Because in the new creation, According to Isaiah 11, all species will live at peace. The wolf and the lamb lying down together, and so on. So just as Jesus fulfills all the Temple theology of Judaism, so Jesus in the Gospels fulfills the Sabbath theology of Judaism. Jesus is the Temple in person. Jesus is the Sabbath in person. He has brought God' age forward from the ultimate future into the immediate present. And therefore, and I see this in the synoptic healing stories as well, as well as in John, therefore it's a matter of space and time both now being focused on Jesus. And I would want to add to that, by the way. This wasn't the question, but I would want to add and materiality as well. So space, time and matter, the matter of God's new age comes forward to meet us in Jesus. And I think that's the basis of Christian sacramental theology. That's something I've explored in one of my books, but I think for the Sabbaths, the point is this is Jesus doing things which effectively say I am bringing in God's new age here and now. And so the reason they object is not just he's breaking the law, though in outline theory, at a superficial level he was, but because he has this huge claim which we see John bringing out, that by doing this he making himself equal to God, he is saying in effect, I am the one bringing in God's new age and indeed embodying it. I think that's what's going on. Can I just add one footnote that our questioner used the word miracle. I have tried to avoid the word miracle in my writing, not because I don't believe God can do extraordinary things. I certainly do, and God can and does do all sorts of extraordinary things, but because our word miracle is too tainted with the language of the 18th and 19th century, which give us a sort of deistic picture of a God who is normally outside the process of the world and who occasionally reaches in, does something extraordinary and then goes away again. That is not the biblical picture of God's action in the world. It isn't God intervening from time to time. As a friend of mine put it recently, God is not into crisis management of that sort. God is always present, always active. And sometimes, especially when Jesus is at work, he brings the new age forward into the present so that the healings and so on are not random actions showing how great Jesus is or whatever they are. The new age arriving in the present in and through Jesus and the power of the Spirit.
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It's a great way to put it, Tom. And it's probably a good note for us to end this week on as well. But in our next episode we've got some great stuff coming up. You know, should you practice self forgiveness? Who were the Samaritans? And what's up with the ascension into heaven now? If you can't wait for more, ask nt write anything content. Until then you could become a subscriber to our bonus episodes. And for the price of a mere coffee, you could get four extra bonus episodes a week where Tom and I talk about things like his latest book, God's Homecoming seven Habits of Highly Effective Christians, or Should Israel Build a Third Temple Today? But for everyone else, remember, you can still send us your questions@askantry.com Tom, I'm still enjoying answering these questions. How about you?
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Yeah, that's fine. These are good questions and it's always delightful. And I should say, I was in the States recently and I met people wherever I went who said, oh, we listen to your podcast regularly and we so enjoy this and that. Which was a great encouragement because, you know, especially on a hot day like it is here in Oxford, sitting here at the computer, it's easy to think, who are these people and what are these questions about? The answer is these are questions that matter. And I am delighted that you and I, Mike, are able to put in our 2 cents worth and you'll get
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more answer to those questions on our next episode. So until then, take care and God bless you all and we'll see you for the next episode of Ask nt. Right.
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Anything.