Queen Victoria and Prince Albert had a quarrel early in their marriage. Albert walked out and went to his room. Victoria followed him. She found the door locked and began pounding on it.
“Who’s there?” Albert asked. “The Queen of England,” was the reply. The door remained locked.
More pounding followed. There was only silence. Then a gentle tap. “Who’s there?” Albert inquired. Victoria replied: “Your wife, Albert.” Albert opened the door immediately.
What made Albert open the door was not the authority that came from the power and status of the Queen of England, but an authority that came from a personal relationship.
That is the kind of authority that Jesus had.
After he called his disciples, Jesus continues his public ministry: he teaches at Capernaum and casts out an unclean spirit. The people are astonished because he taught and healed as one having personal authority unlike the scribes who derived their authority from their role/status.
The crowd cannot identify the source of this authority. The unlikely voice of “a man with an unclean spirit” does: “I know who you are—the Holy One of God!” At the end of Jesus’ ministry, another unlikely voice—the Roman centurion—will identify Jesus: “This man was the Son of God!”
Jesus derived his authority from his intimate and personal relationship with his father.
Jesus’ exercise of this authority, too, was different. He told his disciples that they ought not to flaunt their authority but to serve… as the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve.
He powerfully demonstrated this often: by his compassion in feeding the multitude, by reaching out to the marginalised, by washing his disciples’ feet at the last supper, by cooking breakfast for them on the shore of the Sea of Galilee.
From where do I derive my authority: from my role/ status/ power or from my relationship with my God? How do I relate with others: from power or through relationship?
(By Fr Vinod SDB)