Matthew 12:14-21
“But the Pharisees went out and conspired against him, how to destroy him. When Jesus became aware of this, he departed” (Matthew 12:14-15)
What do we do with nay-sayers in our lives?
Answering this question is probably a fair bit contextual – that is, who the nay-sayer is matters; if it’s your mother, that’s an entirely different thing than if it is your boss at work – but even with this caveat acknowledged, I still think Jesus presents us with a model for how to live graciously and faithfully with every negative-Nancy-or-Newt in our lives. (And wouldn’t such a negative guy be rightly named “Newt”?!).
Step one is recognition of such actions and/or motivations. As the text says, “When Jesus became aware of this.” We have to be empowered to name negative relational patterns for what they are. We don’t name them as an act of judgment, but as an act of truth-telling.
Step two is the establishment of healthy boundaries. As the text says, “he departed.” Even Jesus, the One sent to be the bridge between humanity and God, still establishes healthy boundaries. This is not a rejection of anyone, but rather a form of accepting them for who they ought to be even as they act as they oughtn’t.
Step three is to keep doing the mission or ministry to which we’ve been called. That’s what Jesus does in the rest of the unquoted passage. He keeps healing. He keeps investing in those who follow rather than those who scheme. It’s not that He’s unaware of the negativity, but rather that He can’t afford to let such detractors set the agenda. It is a case study in how the squeaky wheel doesn’t have to get the grease.
Of course, why even mention this aside from the fact that these events transpire in Jesus’ life? What’s its relevance to us? Quite a bit, I suspect, if we are living with the same Kingdom-passion that Jesus consistently puts on full display. For to live as one for whom “the Kingdom of God is in your midst,” means to live with the conviction that what is isn’t necessarily what ought to be and that what ought to be can, indeed, be.
It means to live with the conviction that good health should be available to all and not just the fortunate (and, therefore, when circumstances conspire against good health, we do what we must to overcome those circumstances). It means to live with the conviction that everyone – even criminals – can be handled in a just manner that doesn’t leave anyone unnecessarily dead and that this doesn’t mean one hates the police. It means to live with the conviction that God has created a world with enough resources in it for everyone to eat, drink, and live in basic safety and security, rather than succumb to the world’s dog-eat-dog ethos.
And when you begin to live in this manner, you will find any number of “Pharisees” who plot and conspire to destroy you or your credibility. To live in this manner is to court the ire of the conspiracy theorist, the America-first and America-only “patriot,” the corporate capitalist with more loyalty to Wall Street than Main Street. Each of these Pharisees await us in the world when we live like citizens of God’s Kingdom.
And so, it is important for us to learn to live faithfully in conflict and the model Jesus provides us does just that. Amen.
