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95 Once Again: Power Chapter 4 As we have shown, it is possible to read the entire New Testament as the story of a power struggle between a destructive autonomous power that is called mythologically the devil, anthropologically the flesh, and theologically sin, on the one hand, and the good news of the rule of God, on the other hand, which does good to its counterpart, saves, redeems, builds up, endows with gifts, and is thus perfected as a “spiritual,” empowering power in the weak. Jesus of Nazareth bore witness to the presence of this rule of God in his authoritative speaking and acting, which were God’s activity through him in favor of the “weary and heavy-laden,” and in his powerless suffering and dying as trust in God’s activity in him in favor of “the many.” This is why both his life and his suffering can be subsumed under the category of service. For the Gospels, Christ is the “Lord” as the one who serves those who belong to him. Paul writes that Christ, as the one who lowered himself and took on the form of a slave, is constituted by God the Father as Kyrios over the entire cosmos. 96 Power, Service, Humility Since those who follow him owe their life to Jesus’ gift of himself in service and since they are “a new creation” as believers who live “in Christ,” they are not only obligated by the example of Jesus to a different kind of conduct. Rather, they are also enabled to do so in the fellowship “in Christ” that is established through his gift of self, because, as the exalted Lord, he is “in their midst,” because his Spirit “dwells” in them and “drives” them—and because the God who has drawn near through him as “Father” “gives” them “all things.” As “servants of the Lord Jesus Christ,” therefore, they are likewise children and heirs of God the Father, and thus they are free. When they are urged to adopt an attitude and a behavior of reciprocal service, which does not begin with the “I” but thinks on the basis of the “thou,” the goal is thus not self-denial but self-realization as a life together with God and with the neighbor. Dietrich Bonhoeffer says that “the God of the Bible” is the God “who through his powerlessness gains power and space in the world.”1 The one who serves, the one who is humble, corresponds to this God and has a share in God’s spiritual power. As M. Bockmuehl observes, “Humility has in that sense an ‘ex-centric’ orientation, taking its focus outside oneself, and finding its power in the power of God.”2 Or, to refer back once again, with words of Mother Teresa, to the scene of the temptation of Jesus with which we began this book: “If there is one [sic] virtue that terrifies the Devil, it is humility and compassion.”3 ...

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