Jesus As Hero, Savior, And Friend

One question I often think about during the Lenten and Easter seasons is whether historical knowledge about Jesus can help us much to believe that he is Christ and Lord. I try to keep an open mind on the possibility that it can, because modern methods of historical study do bridge all sorts of gaps between the present and the past, and because I continue to seek encounters with a very present, and not just a long departed friend and savior. The problem is that much of what can be learned about Jesus from the available records brings us no closer to the man himself than walking the walk with him brought his own contemporaries.

One image prominent in those records is the image of a heroic man who displayed extraordinary courage as he faced adversity of many kinds, in service to a cause that almost everyone who learned of it rejected. But to this distressing image was soon attached another, of a vindicated prophet whose resurrection was first proclaimed with a jubilant spirit, and later with a take-no-prisoners one. Death is swallowed up in victory. Then again, maybe not quite: the kingdom already here is a kingdom which, paradoxically, is still yet to come. And so, Jesus the hero became king either of a not quite ready for prime time kingdom, or of a kingdom not of this world at all.

A more complex image than that of Jesus as Hero is the image of Jesus as Savior. What makes this latter especially attractive is that it focuses attention on the very suffering that hero imagery wants us to get past. After all, what kind of a hero dies an ignominious death as a despised criminal? A hero ascending into the heavens looks much better, but at that point, of course, he stops being a hero and turns into something beyond the merely human altogether. The risen Jesus has always been a little spooky; it is easier to relate to him the longer he stays on the cross. Of course, that works only if we keep telling ourselves that he is the one who does all the suffering. After all, what kind of a savior makes us take up a cross ourselves?

There is not much about the biblical images of Jesus's heroism --- e.g., setting his face "resolutely" toward Jerusalem (Luke 9:51); insisting repeatedly that he lays down his life of his own free will (John 10:18) --- that draws me especially close to him; earthly heroes do stuff like this all the time. And the suffering savior image of dogma is little better: it has never made sense to me that someone else should have to pay for sins that are uniquely my own. This kind of substitutionary sacrifice, ransom to the Devil, appeasement of an offended God kind of thinking is highly dubious, from any moral perspective worthy of the name.

Another Savior image in the New Testament is more promising. It is the one that Luke seems to have had in mind when he put his own distinctive spin on Peter's three denials of Jesus. They take place in the courtyard of the high priest's house. Under heavy guard, Jesus sees and hears at least the third denial, and "turned and looked at Peter." (22:61) When I think of what that look must have shown, at least in Luke's mind --- a disappointment and a sadness beyond all human reckoning --- I want to run frantically toward the soothing words of his theology, and of John's even more, with their idea that since Jesus knew what was coming all along, he couldn't have been all that surprised by Peter's betrayal, and I shouldn't get too upset about it either. But that is theology talking, not Jesus. At least, not the Jesus into whose face I look when I face my own uncountable denials. It is the suffering on that face that sears me, and saves me. It is the suffering on the face of a lover who lays down his life for his friends. (John 15:13)

I wish that it were possible to know with certainty whether the distinction between being Jesus' servant and being Jesus' friend came from Jesus himself or whether it emerged somewhere along the way of a developing tradition. The truth is, historical knowledge leaves this kind of question unanswered about all of the Gospels' images of Jesus. But the image of being friends with a man who loved people so much that God's very own love became transparent through him is an image that could draw the whole world close to him on its own.