Rance Darity - The Jesus You Never Knew

The Jesus You Never Knew

by Rance Darity

June 8, 2020

When in the Gospel of Luke, Jesus told the ‘Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus’ he was addressing head-on the issues of wealth and poverty, social neglect and suffering, privilege and discrimination.

He wasn’t giving a description of the afterlife, you know, the popular 'heaven and hellfire' scenario you probably heard growing up.

He was employing familiar hyperbolized imagery, the kind found in Second Temple Judaism, about the outcomes of life awaiting his hearers for the kind of life lived now. It was his way of portraying the coming kingdom which will sweep away the world as we experience it now and bring in the world as it will be under the reign of God.

Fundamentalist preachers will tell you Jesus spoke more about hell than about heaven. That is completely wrong.

Jesus spoke continually about one thing (as reported in the Synoptic Gospels) - the arrival and inauguration of the Kingdom of God. And he repeatedly talked about it in terms of the socio-economic changes it brings along with it. Riches and poverty, power and privilege, insiders and outsiders were the paramount issues he preached about. [Simply said, it was about social justice to the oppressed and outsider].

This is the Jesus of the Gospels. Familiarize yourself with him. Jesus didn’t kiss up to the rich and powerful. He reached across to the poor, the sick, the elderly, and the outsider. [And His message was for spiritual and social action today; not to wait around doing nothing till heaven came. Jesus spoke out for his fellow man].

- RD

#TheJesusyouneverknew