Introduction

Free Men Living Like Slaves: In the United States, the North and South fought a bloody Civil War over the issue of slavery. With the ratification of the 13th amendment to the American constitution, slaves became freed people… At least that was the idea. Because of widespread racism and the economic realities of the southern states, many ‘freed’ slaves lived as free people in name only. Being free isn’t the same thing as living free.

As monumentous as the emancipation of a nation’s slaves was, What we celebrate on easter is so much larger. We too have lived in bondage, along with all of creation, and we have all been set free from that bondage by what Jesus has done in his death and resurreciton But like the freed American slaves, we may find that having the status as freed people isn’t very helpful if we don’t learn to live as free people.

For the freed American slaves, freedom was expressed in things like owning property, working a job of their own choosing or living where they wanted. For freed spiritual slaves, our freedom is expressed by living a new life of God’s abundant blessing. This involves blessings like forgiveness of sins, reconciliation with God and adoption as God’s children. The invitation to this new life is open to all

Let’s look at the difference, then, between the old life of scarcity and the new life of abundance. Let us live in the abundance of God’s freedom, not the scarcity our old-creation lives.

Old Creation = Scarcity

The world we live in—what we might call old creation—is one of scarcity. This scarcity of our world isn’t God’s design, but a consequence of sin. The Bible describes this tension between his design and our reality in the story of the Garden of Eden. In the story, God creates humans to live in communion with him in a world where their material needs are easily taken care of. Food literally grew on trees

God is the source who feely gives life and sustenance to people. But God had given them one command: Don’t eat from the tree of knowledge of Good and evil. I feel it’s important to note, this prohibition isn’t about scarcity: there was plenty of other fruit (especially the fruit of the tree of life) to meet their needs. Instead, it was an opportunity to learn the blessedness of submitting to God—letting him decide what is right and wrong.

Deceived by the serpent, Adam & Eve take the fruit, and through their actions, they declare they know better than God what is right and good. This breaks the relationship with God, the source. When we’re cut off from the source, our world becomes one of scarcity – The things we need and want now come through difficulty. We can see this in God’s judgment over Adam and Eve in two crucial areas: children and food. As a woman in that culture, Eve would produce blessing by bearing children, but now she will only do so with great pain. As a man in that culture, Adam would produce blessing by providing food for his family, but now he will produce it by the sweat of his brow.

As people cut off from God, we live in a world where the things we need and want are hard to come by. This warps relationships between people. It robs us of our abilities to live collaboratively, instead it creates communities in competition with one another. Canadians vs. Americans; Men vs. Women; White vs. Black; Christians vs. Muslims; Protestants vs. Catholics; My family vs. your family; Me vs. you. It is the logic of scarcity that brings about Jesus’ unjust death on Good Friday

The powerful compete to preserve their interests, and Jesus and his message of God’s abundant blessing get in the way of what they desire most

Jesus is a Threat To Rome

First of all, Jesus threatens Rome whose single greatest focus was on the exercise of total power over others. Rome’s ambition was to conquer as much territory and as many people as possible, so their they become Caesar’s. Jesus’ message about the Kingdom of God threatens this power.

The kingdom message says that because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, we have been reconciled to God and can now live under his blessed authority. Even though Jesus isn’t saying he’s going to depose Caesar, it’s a threat to Rome’s ambitions. Jesus claims to be a king – one to whom people give their ultimate allegiance. If Jesus is my king, when someone else makes a demand of me that is contrary to Jesus’ commands, Jesus must win out.

Now, many of the things Jesus commands his disciples to do, coincide with what Caesar would tell his people to behave. Live at peace, don’t steal, don’t kill, etc. But in the exercise of his power, sometimes Caesar demands things that are contrary to Jesus’ commands (like worship Rome’s gods or or killing Rome’s enemies) In our zero-sum world the power that Jesus exercises comes at the expense of Caesar’s power – So for Rome, Jesus’ kingdom message is intolerable.

Rome’s authority comes from it’s ability to intimidate people to obey Caesar’s wishes. So their power evaporates if they don’t push back against those who refuse to bow the knee. Pontius Pilate doesn’t consent to Jesus’ execution because he misunderstands and thinks that Jesus is a rebel raising an army to depose him. Instead, He knows it’s not possible for both Caesar and Jesus to be Lord—So to allow Jesus to challenge Caesar total authority, threatens Caesar’s grip on power. The Jewish authorities functionally blackmail Pilate into executing Jesus. They tell him, “If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar. Anyone who claims to be a king opposes Caesar” (John 19:12, NIV). They imply that they can go over his head to Caesar and tattle on him for tolerating someone else’s claims to be a king. Caesar wouldn’t tolerate such a treat – There’s only so much power to go around, and Caesar wants the whole pie. So The logic of Scarcity means that for Rome to have the power it demands, it mush crush Jesus.

Threatening The Religious Authorities

At the same time, Jesus’ kingdom agenda also threatens the Jewish religious establishment. In the Old Testament law, the tribe of Levi is denied an allotment of farmland because their job is to serve as ministers in God’s temple. Instead of farming for food, they were supposed to get their food from Israel’s tithes and offerings given by the other tribes. In times of religious backsliding, this might have made them vulnerable: if people weren’t giving, they weren’t eating. But the serial occupation of the Promised Land by foreign leaders, accentuated Jewish national identity, which was defined religiously. Jews became more Jewish because they were ruled over by people who weren’t Jewish That put the Levites, and especially the priestly families in an enviable place because they have an institutionalized place as the middlemen between God and the people. They have parleyed the people’s religious fervency into riches and personal religious power.

When Jesus proclaims a forgiveness of sins that doesn’t involve temple sacrifices, their monopoly on religious power was threatened. To put it crassly, Jesus is giving away ‘for free’ what they’ve been selling. If people don’t need to bring burnt offerings and fellowship offerings their livelihood is threatened. Without their position as middlemen between God and sinners, they lose their prestige. Because they live with a scarcity mindset, the life Jesus comes to freely give must be opposed, because it takes away their advantages. Because Jesus represents a threat to politically and religiously powerful people in a world of scarcity, he has to be taken out.

Good Friday is the logical conclusion of the Scarcity Mentality. Someone promoting freedom from the power of tyranny will always run afoul of all the world’s tyrants.

The Dawn of a New Order

Ironically, the hostility of those tyrants towards Jesus’ message leads them to violence against Jesus, and that violence creates the reality they feared. On the cross, Instead of calling down legions of angels to smite his enemies, Jesus allows himself to be crucified, even calling on the Father to forgive those responsible. In this Jesus shows us God’s abundant love and mercy.

At the moment of Jesus’ death the veil in the temple that separated the Holy of Holies—God’s dedicated space—from the rest of creation was torn in two. In this, God shows his presence is available not just to the high priest (who could only enter once per year) but to everyone.

When Jesus overcomes death, making a way for people to be raised to new life, he strips Rome of it’s most powerful tool of state power – the ability to permanently end those who oppose their rule. And the tool they used to terrorize people into submission was crucifixion

When life returns to Jesus’ body a new way of being has been birthed in our world. This is the grandest moment in history: A new world is breaking into the old World. As Paul puts it: “Death is swallowed up in victory”.

I want to pause to read the story: Luke 24:1–12NIV

1 On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4 While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. 5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6 He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 7 ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ” 8 Then they remembered his words. 9 When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. 10 It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles. 11 But they did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense. 12 Peter, however, got up and ran to the tomb. Bending over, he saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and he went away, wondering to himself what had happened.

New Creation = Abundance

The message of the kingdom is so unexpected the disciples struggle to understand it. But once they get their heads around it, it changes everything. The world in which they lived was defined by scarcity, But if they receive the Kingdom of God—meaning if they submit to God’s loving rule in their lives—their perspective on things changes radically.

Power

In the Old Creation, power was a thing to be monopolized for your own advantage, but Jesus models a different way of exercising power. Jesus shows this vision of power by washing his disciples’ feet, and by dying for them. When God reigns among us, those in authority don’t cling to their privilege, instead, they use it as a means of serving others. As Jesus says,Mark 10:42–45NIV

“You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. 43 Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. 45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:42–45, NIV)

To live in this sort of abundance means that we don’t need to protect our personal power to avoid being exploited by others. People living in this new way can serve others knowing it doesn’t diminish them, but rather it enhances their status in God’s eyes. In the world’s kingdom of scarcity, others’ greatness comes at my expense; in God’s kingdom, others’ greatness is a benefit to me.

Wealth

Our perspective on material wealth is also changed. We can trust God to provide for our needs.

Paul, writing to thank the Philippians for sharing materially with him. Lest they regret their generosity, he assures them: “And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19, NIV). This doesn’t mean that Christians should go on a shopping spree to buy everything their hearts desire, trusting God to pick up the tab. Instead, it means that when we submit to the authority of Jesus we become part of a community where sharing is the norm. We see this demonstrated in the early chapters in Acts, when people would sell their property to share with those who didn’t have enough. Also when the churches in Europe and Asia minor voluntarily take up an offering to help out the church in Jerusalem when a famine is prophesied.

God’s kingdom reorients our relationship with material wealth. As Jesus says, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” Some bread (material possession) is necessary of course, but the greatest treasure isn’t in the scarce things, but in God (to whom we have unhindered access). The resurrection of Jesus opens us up a greater treasure than the scarce, worldly treasures we pursue.

Transitioning from Scarcity to Abundance

We have been given a wonderful new life of abundance, but we can only enjoy it, if we allow our desires to be transformed by it. Just as many slaves freed after the US Civil War continued in slavery (in a practical sense) so many Christians, set free by Jesus death and resurrection, continue to live in slavery to the logic of the old creation of scarcity. The new age of abundance starts with new desires and priorities. To quote Sheryl Crowe, “It’s not having what you want; It’s wanting what you’ve got.” Abundance doesn’t come from getting that bigger house, new car, or the promotion at work. Abundance comes from being reconciled to God and understanding the immensity of that treasure.

If my heart is set on this world’s treasures—power over others and material wealth—then I won’t experience Jesus’ kingdom as abundance. If my treasure is bread, Jesus’ command for me to share my bread with others feels like scarcity. Instead, I need to understand that in the sharing I can discover a greater treasure: Belonging to a community of mutual love and care. If my treasure is power over others, then I will see Jesus’ call to humbly serve others as scarcity. I need to understand that looking important in others’ eyes isn’t as great a treasure as looking impressive to God.

Jesus asks us to give up our worldly treasures so he can fill our hands with heavenly treasures that we can have in abundance. God’s promise of abundant life, then, isn’t a promise that God will indulge our carnal appetites. Rather, it’s a promise that if we will allow God to transform our appetites, our greatest desire will become what he freely gives. This is the meaning of the oft misunderstood verse Psalm 37:4:, “Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart’. It’s not saying that if I can somehow make myself delight in God, he’ll hold up his end of the bargain by giving me that new Ferrari. It means if I set my heart on God, then God will reward me with…God. If desiring God is a means to getting some other treasure, then I haven’t learned to properly desire God.

Enjoying the abundant life requires unlearning our old desires. We’re used to living in that old world, so it’s hard to redirect our priorities and values to align with God’s kingdom values. But, if we pursue God’s kingdom as our treasure—as counterintuitive as that feels at first—then our hearts will begin to desire rightly on their own. But if we look to God to be the provider of our worldly desires, it won’t work. First, God doesn’t promise to give us the things we long for just because we long for them And Second, if we do happen to get these things, we’re going to discover, that they can’t do for us what we hoped they would. The things in which we most naturally place our hopes make false promises. They can’t be the abundance we want them to be.

True treasure is about freedom from the enslavement to this world and its treasures so that we can live with God. On the cross, Jesus disarmed the authorities of this world. In the resurrection, Jesus has made it possible for us to live a new life outside of their grasp. The invitation is open to all:

28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30, NIV).

In a world of scarcity, we will find no rest. For we must always guard what we have and pursue what we don’t. But God invites us into the new world made possible through Jesus’ death and resurrection where the greatest treasures are free for the taking, if only we can learn to treasure them. So together let’s learn to live in that new world, by seeking God’s kingdom and his righteousness rather than worldly treasure. When we do we will find that we live in a new world of his abundant blessing.