Clark, W. Royce

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LeavenVolume 3Issue 3 The Lord's Supper Article 71-1-1995The Supper of the Servant of GodW. Royce ClarkFollow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leavenPart of the Biblical Studies Commons, Christianity Commons, and the Religious Thought,Theology and Philosophy of Religion CommonsThis Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Religion at Pepperdine Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Leaven byan authorized administrator of Pepperdine Digital Commons. For more information, please contact Kevin.Miller3@pepperdine.edu.Recommended CitationClark, W. Royce (1995) "The Supper of the Servant of God," Leaven: Vol. 3: Iss. 3, Article 7.Available at: http://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leaven/vol3/iss3/720 Leaven, vol. 3, #3The SupperofThe Servant of Godby W. Royce ClarkThe Lord's Supper takes its meaning fromJesus'death. Jesus' death, in turn, derives its mean-ing fromwhohe was, what he claimed about himself,what he wanted for the world, and what ultimatelyhappened to him. The church depicts him speakingof himself rather strangely, combining thesupranatural "Son ofMan" of certain Jewish apoca-lyptic writings with the "Servant of God" in Isaiah,insisting that the "SonofMan" was destined to serverather than be served, and to givehis life as a ransomformany. He predicted this role ofserving even to thepoint of self-sacrifice also for his disciples (Mark10:42-45). Therefore, those who participate in theLord's Supper pledge themselves to a life ofservice toothers, even to the point of death.But why a life of service to others? There ismore to it. His primary concern was no privatistic,otherworldly redemption in the hereafter. Instead,the church painted its picture of Jesus as one whochampioned the cause of the marginalized, the poor,the outcasts, the people who appeared not to careabout spiritual things such as the Torah. He re-garded the treatment they experienced in life at thehands ofothers as unjust, so as he befriended them,he continually insisted that God requires not sacri-fice so much as love, mercy, and justice. At hisbaptism he was identified as God's "servant" (Mark1:11;Matt 3:17;Luke 3:22). His role was to establish"justice in the earth. "Behold my servant, whom I uphold,my chosen, in whom my soul delights;I have put my Spirit upon him,he will bring forth justice to thenations.He will not cry or lift up his voice,or make it heard in the street;a bruised reed he will not break,and a dimly burning wick he will notquench;he will faithfully bring forth justice.He will not fail or be discouragedtill he has established justice in theearth,and the coastlands wait for his law.(Isaiah 42:1-4)Emerging from the tests he encountered inthe wilderness subsequent to his baptism, Jesusidentified himself in the Nazareth synagogue as thesame servant ofGodwho, in preaching goodnews tothe poor, would set free the captives and liberatethose whowere oppressed (Luke 4:18-19;Isa 61:1-2).He adopted this vision ofhis service to others for thesake ofjustice.Not only dothe texts portray Jesus as statingthat his unselfish and divinely appointed service wasin pursuit of justice on earth, and not a merelyinternal or spiritualized salvation or rescue out ofthis world, but notably he is only the paradigmservant. That is, in both the servant ofGodin Isaiah1Clark: The Supper of the Servant of GodPublished by Pepperdine Digital Commons, 1995as well as the son of man in Daniel, the internaltextual understanding is that these figures repre-sent the whole people ofGod,not just one individual.So the group itself is the servant and son ofman, thegroup itself is therefore to replicate the paradigm ofmorality and justice found in this Jesus. This is thereason Jesus was not stretching the passage when hetold them that they too would have to serve ratherthan be served; it could not be otherwise if they werehis followers.This means that the Lord's Supper is notprimarily a means ofmere spiritual introspection ofsomany isolated individual Christians. It is rathera pledging to serve as a community to bring aboutjustice in this world. Otherwise, it has nothing to dowith Jesus' self-image, his mission, nor the resurrec-tion power bywhich he commissioned his disciples tocontinue the precise work that he began. This is notreading a "social gospel" into the text. There issimply no other possible interpretation of the textand life ofJesus but this gospel ofjustice on the earth.Once we see this, it is not strange that theFourth Gospel also has Jesus insisting that the"servant" will have the same fate as the "master,"that is, his community of disciples may well berequired to serve to the point ofsuffering as he. Theyhave the same mission of propagating justice on theearth, and that may well bring the "suffering" ontheir heads depicted even in Isaiah. Injustice, afterall, is not easily overthrown! And it would probablybe expecting far too much to think it would be actu-ally abolished by the death of this one exceptionalJesus as exemplar! Injustice is sodeeply entrenched,in fact, that Jesus predicted that people might eventhink they were on the side of justice and God bykilling Jesus' own disciples who themselves wereemulating his love and concern for justice (John15:20;16:2-3)! What an irony!So the work ofthe servant is the work ofhiscommunity, just as the "body" of Christ is also thechurch. The servant and his "body"are as insepa-rable in the reality oftheir commonpursuit ofjusticeon the earth as they are in the holy communion.Had Jesus' call been merely for everyone tofind his or her own individual salvation, hewouldnothave needed to enlist others in his mission, to askthem to endanger their own lives. Had the vocationassigned to the servant been merely to suffer for hisown sins, injustice would never have been addressedsince the servant himself was not unjust, especiallyin comparison with the world at large. But God'sintention in Isaiah, understood and followedbyJesus,was to bring a frontal attack against injustice-notthrough compromise ofprinciples, nor through someformalized and bureaucratic strategic program, norThe Lord's Supper 21certainly by meeting sin with more sin or fire withmore fire-but to attack injustice with innocence,service, love, and non-violent protest. That was pre-cisely what he did on the cross.However, this prophetic protest and "servantof God"protest against the injustice of the world isoften stifled by a Lord's Supper or eucharist thatfocuses on Christology-for-Christology's-sake or forthe sake merely ofworship. Worship is a legitimatepart ofthe supper. But it is only the beginning point,not the goal. Jesus' goal was "justice on the earth."God,through the servant, is in factworthy ofworshipby us only because the servant stands forjustice andthe servant's representation of God is of a God ofjustice. And this focus on justice of the servant andjustice of God differs radically from a merelychristological observance of the supper in which thefocus is on the mystery of the servant being of the"same substance" as the Father or the mystery ofthecapacity in which Christ is "present" today in thesupper.J As a matter offact, the Fourth Gospel doesemphasize a "sameness" or likeness between Godand Jesus, but it is not a Nicene focus on "samesubstance." Rather, it uniquely sees a "sameness"that is shared not only by God and Jesus, but also bythe church. Jesus' concern in describing this is not toawaken us to the fact that we are of the "samesubstance" with Godor share somedivine attributes;2instead, he understands love to be the quality sharedby God himself and all his disciples-a love thatdirects one through mercy to serve others for jus-tice-"love, mercy, and justice. "Therefore the servant-both Jesus and hischurch-realizes its unity with God in its pursuit ofjustice on earth through love-through a moral lifedictated by an ethic ofmutual concern. And no moreobviousmanifestation ofthat realization occurs thanin the observance of the supper.It is there, in the observance of the supper,that we recall that Jesus set his face to go to Jerusa-lem to die for that cause, that the "kingdom ofGod"would initiate God's will being "done on earth as inheaven," even as he taught his disciples to pray. It isthere that wehear ourselves, as those disciples ofold,even when lacking in full understanding of his con-sciousness or mission, agree to go along with himwherever he goes, even if it means dying with him. Itis there that we realize that only those who arewilling to forfeit their lives for his cause are thosewho truly find life. It is there that we come to graspthat the most potent force for justice in the world isthe relinquishing ofone's rights and privileges, eventhe right to live, if necessary, in order that others getjustice.2Leaven, Vol. 3 [1995], Iss. 3, Art. 7http://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leaven/vol3/iss3/722 Leaven, vol. 3, #3For what credit is it, if when you dowrongand are beaten for it you take it patiently?But if when you do right and suffer for ityou take it patiently, you have God's ap-proval. For to this you have been called,because Christ also suffered for you, leav-ing you an example, that you should fol-low in his steps. He committed no sin; noguile was found on his lips. When he wasreviled, he did not revile in return; whenhe suffered, he did not threaten; but hetrusted to him who judges justly. Hehimself bore our sins in his body on thetree, that we might die to sin and live torighteousness. By his wounds you havebeen healed. (I Peter 2:20-24)It is much less disconcerting, of course, toengage in the supper or communion as merely a mealof spiritual introspection in which I devote the wholeof it to contemplating the divine mystery of God inChrist, or my own unworthiness and salvation byGod's grace, or my individual public and private sins.But this kind of meal was unknown to Jesus!Even in the quotation from I Peter above, theauthor cannot separate the Redeemer Christ fromthe Ethical Exemplar Christ.3 Despite the fact thatJesus, as servant, propounded no formalized explicitsocial reform programs, he nevertheless addressedreal structures and authorities of injustice.f He losthis life in the process. He stood for the marginalizedpeople of his society over against even the religiousauthorities, and was nailed to the cross by the reli-gious leaders' view of the Torah. In his concern forother people and their real lives and justice, he daredto get mixed up in actual life ra ther than mere theory,which always contains ambiguities rather than abso-lute principles buttressed with crystal-clear direc-tions for implementation. So his piety was ques-tioned, his spiritual insights were ridiculed, his rela-tion with Godwas doubted, his character was assas-sinated, his morality was belittled. He was a gluttonand drunkard, a Samaritan and even demon-pos-sessed by their assessments. Better to kill him thathe not bother any more people!Perhaps there's the real rub. Perhaps towhat he calls his disciples is toohard, toodemanding.Certainly the difficulty is not that we have no truenotion of what "justice" entails! Were we to pleadthat kind ofignorance, wewould be admitting to notbeing able to recognize what Jesus was all about, norwhat we thought was fair in life. But we are called toapply that justice within the terribly complex andambiguous intricacies of actual human life, and thatmay well cause people to question our motives, ourdedication, our ideals, our relation with God,and ourmorals. And we are so attached to whatever advan-tages we enjoy in this life, so long as the status quo isretained, that wefind it almost incredulous to believethat Jesus really wants us on the firing line for"justice" if it could cost us and our reputation somuch! Better to stay entrenched with the brethren,to speak religious cliches among those who appreci-ate them, to talk to ourselves about our hope ofheaven. Better to be satisfied with the relativejustice that has prospered our lives; better to think ofgreater, more eternal missions such as getting peopleready for heaven. Better to spiritualize away all thethis-worldly implications of those quotations Jesusused from the Jewish Bible. But have we forgottenthe gospels? It was Jesus who promised that onlythose who are willing to identify with him in hiscause-to bring justice on eorth=evesv to the extentof losing their lives, will thereby preserve or findtheir lives-and, conversely, those who are so con-cerned to preserve their lives as to dissociate them-selves to a degree from his cause of justice for theworld will surely lose their very being, their trueselves, in the process (Mark 8:31-9:1).The supper is our participation with Christin his servant mission. We are not forced to share inthat service forjustice on the earth. But there is noway we can truly share his mission without sharinghis fate. Any other kind of observance of the Lord'sSupper would be our denial of him. However, hisultimate "fate" is symbolized not merely by the crossbut byhis "resurrection," and forus that kind of"fate"would be "to die for." It may well be!w. Royce Clark teaches religion at Seaver College,Pepperdine University, Malibu, California.3Clark: The Supper of the Servant of GodPublished by Pepperdine Digital Commons, 1995

The Supper of the Servant of God

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The Supper of the Servant of God

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