April 30, 2021
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 2 which, at the beginning of the Psalter, highlights the centrality of King David to Israel’s faith.
For Christians, the archetype of King David serves as point of insight to explore who Jesus Christ is for us. Of course we know that Christ is God, but we have no direct experience of God. So we try to understand God through symbols which, although inadequate, give us a context to form our relationship with God.
Psalm 2 gives us two such archetypal symbols: king and son. For us, that combination signals not only Christ’s power but the fact that it is directly derived from God. Christ’s power is divine, just as the Creator’s power is divine.
Because of that divine intimacy, the “King-Son” may ask and will receive whatever is requested.
Ask of me and I will give you
Psalm 2; 8-9
the nations for an inheritance
and the ends of the earth for your possession.
Christ’s whole life – Passion, Death, and Resurrection – was that Messianic “Ask” foretold in David. Through Jesus, we too become daughters and sons of God. This is the Good News the disciples preach in today’s first reading.
We ourselves are proclaiming this good news to you
Acts 13:33
that what God promised our fathers
God has brought to fulfillment for us, their children, by raising up Jesus,
as it is written in the second psalm,
“You are my Son; this day I have begotten you.”
This is the Way, the Truth and the Life that Jesus offers in today’s Gospel.
“Master, we do not know where you are going;
John 14: 5-6
how can we know the way?”
Jesus said to him, “I am the way and the truth and the life.
No one comes to the Father except through me.”
The gender-heavy symbols of king and son don’t speak strongly to me, but the image of Christ as my “Requestor” does. I think this morning of another Gospel assurance that I love:
I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing,
John 14: 12-14
and they will do even greater things than these,
because I am going to the Father.
And I will do whatever you ask in my name,
so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.
You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.
Dear Jesus, may we learn what it is
to live fully in your Name.
Music: What a Beautiful Name – Hillsong
Lavish Mercy 