The Pharisees came to Jesus and said to him, Get away from here for Herod Antipas here in Galilee wants to kill you. Jesus responded: Go tell that fox for me, Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work. Yet today, tomorrow and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed outside Jerusalem. Jesus is saying “you are not going to rush me, this will happen down in Jerusalem when I get there.

Jerusalem, Jerusalem the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it. Jesus is on the western slope of the Mount of Olives, just across the Kidron Valley from Jerusalem. It is here that Jesus wept over the city that had refused his ministrations. Looking over the city of Jerusalem Jesus could see things that no one else was able to see because of his understanding and insight. Most people when they looked at Jerusalem saw the shining city on the hill, the great Temple. Jesus is looking at it and seeing something else. He is seeing the inside of its flawed status. He sees it as the place where the prophets are stoned. And he says I am going there because I know how to put an end to the faulty sacred system that is based in the temple.

"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!" You were not willing.

Luke’s Gospel begins and ends in the temple in Jerusalem. Zechariah learns in the temple that he and Elizabeth will have a child. Mary and Joseph bring their own child there when the time comes. Simeon and Anna deliver their prophecies there, and Jesus returns when he is 12 years old to take his place among the teachers of Israel.

All told, Luke mentions Jerusalem 90 times in his Gospel, while all the other New Testament writers combined mention it only 49 times. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that for Luke Jerusalem is extremely significant. Jerusalem is the dwelling place of God, the place where God’s glory shall be revealed (Isaiah 24:23). It is also the place where God is betrayed by those who hate the good and love what is evil (Micah 3:2). Nothing that happens in Jerusalem is insignificant. When Jerusalem obeys God, the world spins peacefully on its axis. When Jerusalem ignores God, the whole planet wobbles.

Jerusalem in the time of Jesus is a mess. Herod, the fox is not completely Jewish, he rules not for the best interests of his people but of the Romans. The priests of the temple are illegitimate they are the heirs of John Hyrcanus and not the traditional priestly line that was now in exile near Qumran. The people of Jerusalem do not know who they are they do not hear the voice of the mother hen across the Kidron valley rather they foolishly are following the fox.

Jesus is about to enter into the zone of Jerusalem. It is like a twilight zone. So Jesus says, when we enter the town you are not going to be able to see me any longer. You won’t really see me for who I am when you do see me you are going to shout Crucify him! One way or another gradually all of you won’t see me. The next time you really see me is when you see me by faith. You can’t see what’s really happening until you experience the cross. Then you will be able to see me again and truly say blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Jesus begins by mentioning Herod as a fox and then chooses the image of the hen for himself. Given the number of animals available, it is curious that Jesus chooses a hen. A mother hen is not especially fiersome it does not inspire much confidence. No wonder some of the chicks decided to go with the fox. A mother hen does not have many defensive weapons but she will die for her chicks.

So it should not surprise us that Jesus likens himself to a hen. Jesus is always turning things upside down, so that children and peasants wind up on top while kings and scholars land on the bottom. He is always wrecking our expectations of how things should turn out by giving prizes to losers and paying the last first. So of course he chooses a hen, which is about as far from a fox as you can get. That way the options become very clear: you can live to exploit or you can live to protect.

Jesus won’t be king of the jungle in this or any other story. What he will be is a mother hen, who stands between the chicks and those who mean to do them harm. All she has is her willingness to shield her babies with her own body. If the fox wants the chicks, he will have to kill her first. Which is exactly what happened in the garden of Gethsemane where the fox got the hen and the chicks scattered.

The real power of this powerless stand is seen three days later when death turns into eternal life. Jesus came to change the way that we are gathered together. Not around the big buildings in the biggest city but around the table of bread and wine. The old way of organizing the world is breaking down. We see that we are losing unity. We are scattered socially and psychologically. Jesus came to offer us a new means of being gathered. He came to us as a victim not a power loving victimizer. Jesus will gather us like a hen, not a fox. That is his way, it is the way of the kingdom and it must become our way to.

1. What does Jerusalem symbolize for the Jews and do we have a modern equivalent?

2. What about the figure of the Fox and Hen? Why chose Fox for Herod and a Hen for Jesus?

3. Can the church become a different kind of place where people are really are gathered together differently?