Summary
Chutzpah
Chutzpah is a Yiddish word for boldness, nerve, or holy audacity. It can carry a negative ring—cheekiness, presumption—but at its best it names a confident, unflinching assuredness in what one has to say or do. Scripture, and the book of Acts in particular, is full of it: disciples stepping out and proclaiming the gospel with a nerve that does not come from themselves but from the Holy Spirit.
A clear example unfolds in Acts 13. Invited to speak in the synagogue at Pisidian Antioch, Paul rehearses God's provision throughout Israel's history, shows from Scripture that Jesus is the promise made and the promise fulfilled, and presses the hearers to receive forgiveness of sins through Christ rather than seek righteousness under the law of Moses. The sermon may have lasted only minutes, but the Holy Spirit was already at work softening hearts: the people begged Paul and Barnabas to return the next Sabbath.
A week later "almost the whole city" gathered, with many Gentiles among them Acts 13:44. The Jewish leaders, who themselves had asked for a word, were now "filled with jealousy" and began contradicting and reviling Paul Acts 13:45. It was the same sin Mark names behind the crucifixion—jealousy that handed Jesus over—now driving these leaders to reject the very promise their own Scriptures held out. By rejecting Christ, they were judging themselves unworthy of eternal life; Paul and Barnabas simply named what was already happening.
Rather than retreat, the apostles "spoke out boldly" Acts 13:46. The word had to come to the Jew first, because to Israel were entrusted the oracles of God Romans 3:1-3; and when it was rejected there, they turned to the Gentiles, fulfilling the call laid on them by the Spirit at the start of their mission Acts 13:2 and the Lord's own commission to be "a light for the Gentiles" Acts 13:47. That is chutzpah: faithful nerve in the face of rejection, going where the Spirit sends.
Chutzpah lies at the very heart of the gospel. There is a holy audacity in the claim that something as wretched and humiliating as a Roman cross is the place where God saves the world—that what we would naturally turn away from is in fact our life. It is chutzpah that gathers Christians week after week to receive Christ's body and blood for the forgiveness of sins, chutzpah to confess that sinners are clothed with a righteousness that is not their own but Christ's, given through the waters of Baptism.
That same boldness is the shape of the Christian life in the world. Standing countercultural, speaking forgiveness in Jesus' name, going across the street or across the world as missionaries—none of this rises out of native courage. It is the Holy Spirit, poured out in Baptism, who puts the word on our tongues and the nerve in our bones. As Chutzpah puts it plainly: the bold message has been entrusted to each of us, and the boldness to carry it has already been given.
Video citations
- "Chutzpah" July 14, 2019 — So there was a little old lady who was selling pretzels on the street corner day after day selling pretzels just a dollar of pretzel and every day a young gentleman would pass by and pretty soon…