Team Shmuel

Just call me Team Shmuel. I mean, Lord bless that boy.

He’s a fictional character created by The Chosen to represent the Pharisaic opposition to Jesus. And as the series has progressed, I’m coming to the opinion that this character is one of the most brilliant things about the show.

Yes, he’s a Pharisee. He is passionate about the law. He really frustrates us at the beginning of the story because he seems to be the stereotypical Pharisee we all have in our minds when we read the gospels. The antagonist, always in Jesus’ face and bashing him behind his back. He’s black and white with no grays, and he’s trying to bring our man down.

But people, give him credit for being sincere. As the story progresses and he moves up to Jerusalem to join the Sanhedrin, he is increasingly dismayed by the politics going on there. That’s not what this man is about. Shmuel loves the Lord! Shmuel loves God’s law! Shmuel loves his people and wants to bring them back where they should be in their covenant relationship with their Lord. This man is for real – and you have to love that!

And it gets better: the more actual interaction he has with Jesus, the more he starts to wonder if this preacher might actually be the Messiah. At the very least, he thinks Jesus and his words are worth investigation – and he stands up to the self-important snits in the Sanhedrin to say so. He goes to Jesus at Lazarus’ house with a genuine desire to give this man a chance, hear him out . . . he wants to believe. And as we see him sit at that table, we are rooting for him so hard!

But what happens? Mary happens. Her shockingly scandalous behavior, breaking so many laws and traditions, bathing Jesus’ feet with expensive perfume and uncovering her hair in front of a room full of men . . . and Jesus allowing it! Even praising her for it! The minute this scene starts to play out, his open, searching mind slams shut.

Oh, people. I am Shmuel. And I bet you are, too.

About a year and a half ago, I wrote about the temptation many of us have to make the Bible an idol . . . and friends, you would not believe the trouble that post got me into. Which absolutely confirmed to me the truth of what I was trying to say. If you, like me, grew up in an intellectual, conservative Christian home, we have much too much of a tendency to worship the book and not the author. Our grasp is firm and tight, but it is on the words, not the speaker. Our relationship is with the Bible and NOT with the Lord.

Now, I’m going to give us all a bit of grace here because the Bible is CRITICAL. For most of us, the Bible is the only way we know the Lord we worship at all. (Am I implying there may be other ways? Yes . . . a topic for another day.)

But we forget that while the author of those words is infallible, the translators of those words, and the interpreters of those words, and the scholars and teachers and preachers helping us understand and apply those words . . . all of us sincere and loving hearers of those words . . . we are quite, quite fallible. We mess it up all the time! I can listen to my daughter talking and be absolutely certain that it is her voice I am hearing and yet completely misunderstand what she is trying to communicate to me. In the same way, I can also be certain that the Bible is the Word of God but still interpret something in there incorrectly. It happens all the time. I believe every single one of us will have a gentle conversation with Jesus someday where we find out the embarrassingly long list of things we had completely wrong.

I am Shmuel. I am sincere in my love for the Lord. I am sincere in my desire for his kingdom to come and for his will to be done and for my efforts to contribute to that effort. But I am also quite capable of looking my Lord straight in the face and not recognizing him because he doesn’t look like I thought he should. I am quite capable of grasping so tightly to my limited understanding of scripture (“Do not work on the Sabbath!”) that I demonize the voice of the Holy Spirit trying to mercifully correct my misunderstanding (“But the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath”).

Watching that scene of Shmuel at Lazarus’ house tore my heart apart. Y’all, I want this man to get it. I so hope he comes around by the end of the series. Because even though he’s a Pharisee, he’s a good guy.

He is ME. Have mercy, sweet Jesus.