Feb 21 2007
Lent
Since today is Ash Wednesday, the first day of the 40 Days of Lent, I offer my readers this description of Lent, courtesy of Wikipedia. Click for more details. Join me on the journey to the Cross on Good Friday & to the Open Tomb on Easter Morning.
“In Western Christianity, Lent is the period (or season) from Ash Wednesday to Holy Saturday. In Eastern Christianity, the period before Easter is known as Great Lent to distinguish it from the Winter Lent, or Advent (known in Greek as the “Great Fast” and “Nativity Fast”, respectively). This article tends to discuss Lent as understood and practiced in Western Christianity.
Easter always falls on a Sunday between March 22 and April 25, roughly corresponding to early spring in the Northern Hemisphere. Ash Wednesday, which may fall anywhere between February 4 and March 10, occurs forty-six days before Easter, but Lent is nevertheless considered to be forty days long, due to the fact that Sundays in this season are not counted among the days of Lent. The traditional reason for this is that fasting was considered inappropriate on Sunday, the day commemorating the Resurrection of Jesus.
Easter celebrates the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, while Lent is a time of preparation for Holy Week. Holy Week recalls the events preceding and during the crucifixion, which Christians believe occurred in the Jerusalem of the Roman province Judea, circa AD 30.”
February 21st, 2007 at 18:25
How about you, APN? Or was this post for information purposes only?
February 21st, 2007 at 18:37
Did you really just site Wikipedia? For shame, Adam, for shame!
February 21st, 2007 at 18:52
Elaine: It’s OK to be a morose Lutheran, as long as you can be a loud, annoying Lutheran too, because boy was Martin a pain in the ass! And yes, I just did cite Wikipedia. I’m a firm believer in Wikiality, even if Mr. Colbert isn’t….
February 21st, 2007 at 23:40
February 21st, 2007 at 23:49
Why don’t people call Him Jesus? That’s His name! and what a name it is! Why is He called Christ? My uncertainty about why people don’t evoke His name all goes back to “the name” and it’s incredible attributes. It’s “Christ’s this” and “Christ’s that”, why not “Jesus’ death”, etc. I am not trying to be judgmental, nor dogmatic, it is just my question.
February 22nd, 2007 at 00:25
From there, keeping a Jewish context in mind (since Jesus was a 1st Century, Torah-observant Jew), I go to this passages in the same commentary: “Messiah. The rendering of a Hebrew term meaning ‘anointed one,’ equivalent to the original sense of the Greek term translated ‘Christ.’ In the Old Testament, different kinds of people were anointed, and some of the Dead Sea Scrolls mention two main anointed ones in the end time, a king and a priest. but the common expectation reflected in the biblical Psalms and Prophets was that one of David’s royal descendants would take the throne again when God reestablished His kingdom for Israel. Most people believed that God would somehow have to put down Roman rule so the Messiah’s kingdom could be secure; many seem to have thought this intervention would be accomplished through force of arms. Various messianic figures arose in first-century Palestine, expecting a miraculous intervention from God; all were crushed by the Romans.”
One of the many things that sets Jesus as Messiah apart from everyone else that pretended to be messiah is that He was the only one NOT put down by the Romans; remember the events of the Passion Week — the Romans had no problem with Jesus. It was the Jews who wanted to see Jesus die because He was claiming to be the Messiah, a claim they saw as blasphemy, especially because Jesus didn’t fit in with the typical Pharisee/Sadducee/Zealot game plan for how the Messiah would enter history.
Jesus IS the Messiah; hence, He is The Christ — the apostles throughout the New Testament refer to Jesus as such and Jesus in Matthew 24:4, 5 refers to Himself as Christ — “And Jesus answered and said unto them, ‘Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ, and shall deceive many.” (KJV) Jesus is His name — absolutely & positively. But He is also Christ & there is power in the name of Jesus Christ: “Then Peter said, ‘Silver and gold have I none, but such as I have give I thee: in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk.’” (Acts 3:6, KVJ)
I didn’t take you to be judgmental or dogmatic whatsoever. I welcome questions and I like talking about answers to those questions. I simply feel that referring to Him as The Christ only lends MORE power to the name of Jesus & does in NO way diminish that power. “Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth this man stand before you whole. This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is no other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.” (Peter speaking to the Sanhedrin in Acts 4:10-12, KJV) There is power in the name of Jesus Christ!
Other thoughts anyone?
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:57
I saw a gentleman who is months away from completing his doctorate in Hebrew studies a few months back. He was speaking about the idiom “in the name of”.
He pointed to the idea that often you would see that a son would come “in the name of” his father. It wasn’t that he possessed the name of the father or that his name was exactly the same as the name of the father. The point was that he was carrying on his father’s work. The dream of the father, the work of the father, the very essence of the father was carried on by the son. Or put another way, he was the personification of his father. Which brings me to my point.
This isn’t to say that the name Jesus isn’t important. It is. Very important. The fact is, though, that the man we know from the Bible as Jesus wasn’t the only Jesus that walked the earth at that time — or since. So the question becomes, in my mind, is it the actual word/name JESUS that is important? Or is it that the one who we know as Jesus was carrying on the Fathers work, the Fathers Dream, the very essence of the Father?
Hebrews says that Jesus was the “express image” of God:
Hebrews 1: 1 – 3 (KJV) God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high
It isn’t that the name Jesus isn’t important or less powerful but the name is only as powerful as the one who bears the name. And because the man Jesus was, to say the least, rather powerful in every way, as we all know and believe, his name is inherently powerful.
Not because of the name but because of the person who bore the name. Not because of Jesus but because Jesus was the name of The Christ. Jesus is just a label but “The Christ” is a descriptive of the Son’s essence. And because The Christ had the label of Jesus, the name Jesus becomes important and powerful through Christ who bore the name.