Jusus Gave Us the Church
Jesus knew His way of life was unsustainable. Viewed from the northern extreme of Israel, it was easy for Him to see that it was only a matter of time before the Romans would crush the rebellious nation of Israel and scatter it’s inhabitance to the four corners of the empire – at least the lucky ones who would survive inevitable massacre. Most would be sacrificed on the altar of Roman law and order, victims of the brutality of an empire unkind to such rebellion.
Jesus had seen it all before. The Romans had more than once marched into Galilee to put down rebellion, burning the countryside, razing villages and enslaving the population. He also would have felt the heavy hand of Roman authorities pressed against the people of Galilee because of the multiple uprisings led by numerous political and religious zealots who emerged from the improvised landscape.
Among the many insurrectionists of that time was Judas the Galilean whose failed overthrow would have been witnessed by Jesus as a boy and whose grandfather, Hezekiah, was also killed by the Romans some 20 years before after an unsuccessful overthrow of imperial rule. The Roman historian, Josephus, concluded that the Galileans were “inured to war from their infancy.”
Better than most, Jesus would have had the opportunity to see that all of Israel was but a small and relatively insignificant dot on the map compared to the massive Roman Empire. Living in the extreme north of His nation, exposed to the geopolitical dynamics of the Empire, Jesus understood how the world worked. Trade routes created an intersection of cultures in His own back yard from Persia, the Mediterranean, Africa and Europe. Better than His more conservative religious counterparts living in the religious bubble of Jerusalem, Jesus saw things from a larger, more pragmatic perspective.
Jesus knew that Israel’s present course of unconcealed rebellion against the Empire would lead to total annihilation of their nation. It was inevitable. It was only a matter of time. Just as easily as Rome had broken the backs of rebellions led by zealous Galileans in the past, they could easily quell any such violent uprising again. He knew that to overthrow the empire by force was impossible. Prophetically, He could see the day coming when His nation in its present condition would be totally destroyed by the Romans. He knew that in order to survive, God’s people and their message would have to become less political and nationalistic and more spiritually based. It would also have to become palatable for people of other cultures. With Israel ceasing to exist as a nation and their political and religious center (Jerusalem and the temple) destroyed, a new wineskin would be needed in order to contain a new understanding of the Kingdom of God in its spiritual sense.
This is where the concepts that would soon reshape the world were first made clear in the mind of Jesus. This is where He received a divine download from God concerning the new form His people would take. A new strategy had to be developed in order to preserve God’s people in a hostile environment. Its message had to challenge people to complete dedication to the cause while at the same time, remaining adaptable enough to be accepted by the many cultures and people groups that comprised the Roman Empire.
Jesus needed to create a new wineskin that could handle the new wine He was about to pour out upon the earth!
Rome’s willingness to accept many diverse cultures and absorb them into the Empire was the key to expanding Jesus’ strategy. The Kingdom of God had to change shapes and be realized without violence in a political environment attuned to insurrection. It had to grow organically within the boundaries of an empire that was diverse and widespread. The old strategies of implementing God’s Kingdom by brute force and violence would never work. This new form of the Kingdom needed to be nonthreatening, organic, innocent, inclusive, transient, decentralized and nonthreatening to an empire wary of insurgence.
His answer was the church!