The Beloved Son

And a voice came from heaven: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."(1:11)

The voice from heaven is saying like this: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased." In a more precise explanation the core of confession for the early Christian community, just as the writers of each of the Gospels including the writer of Mark's keep on telling in their Gospels, is the proposition that Jesus is the son of God as mentioned in the beginning of Mark's Gospel. And furthermore, he is not only a son, but also through the Old Testament Jesus is analyzed as the one and only son of God.

Maybe Some people could wonder what the word "analysis" means, but as long as we keep on reading the Bible, this kind of wondering might keep on coming back, I think. The Jesus Christ event is a history. But that history is not established by evidence, but it is an analyzed history. You don't have to worry about if that event did not happen actually. The life and history of human beings could not be solved by saying so simply it is true or not. Not every objective fact could be meaningful. Through historical process, what it could be expanded with more blood and flesh, the basic meaning of the event could be much deeper. That means "analysis". This kind of problem will be mentioned again in a different situation, so that let us go back to the words of today.

How could the early Christian community know Jesus is the son of God? Jesus did not say for himself "I am a son of God". Just like he never tells that he is the Messiah to the disciples, he never tells he is the son of God. But there must be some traces in his words, which the disciples regarded him as the Son of God. Jesus used to call him "my father". Sometimes he even called him "Dad". Now we could acknowledge God as our endearing father who has been waiting for the prodigal son through Jesus with the early Christian community, not as the object of fear.

Now in here we don't have to argue about God as a father or a motherly image. This fathership in here means a father who has personal relationship with the human beings, not a father who has masculine characteristics. God is not a king in heaven who watches and judges and gives some punishment according to the rule of "cause and effect" from heaven, but he is who came to earth and lived among us as a human being. In his writing "God on the Cross" Jürgen Moltmann pointed out this as God who exists among pains and sorrows of human beings.

The fact that God descended from heaven to the place of a human on his body is described as "incarnation" by the theological lexicon and he is Jesus Christ. What Jesus is God with a human body is Christology and also it is doctrine of God. Jesus and God are different persons but basically they are one. To know Jesus means to know God. Mark explains such faith of the early Christian community by this mythological style. From heaven he says there was a voice which says "you are my beloved son." I like to tell some phrases from the Gospel of John. Pay attention to the report of the writer for John's Gospel, because it could have very important and decisive contents for this.

Jesus gave them this answer: "I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does. For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does. Yes, to your amazement he will show him even greater things than these. For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son gives life to whom he is pleased to give it. "I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life. I tell you the truth, a time is coming and has now come when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live. For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to judge because he is the Son of Man. (John 5:19-21, 24-27)

Lord, we came to know God as a father though you and enabled to trust the father. Holding this trusting heart I want to live in this world.