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The Trouble with Jesus
by Constance Hastings
A Losing Life
Dec 17, 2019
Love God, Love Losers
How Not to Change the World would be a good title for Jesus’ autobiography. Or maybe, How to Take Good Ideas and Get Killed for It. Or, Love God, Love Losers. If Jesus came to change the world, he was his own worst enemy as he went about it. Common sense just wasn’t his forte.
Leaders with idealistic platforms are wonderful to read about, but everyone knows that doesn’t get votes. Practical policies that work the system to everyone’s benefit make the better headline. But no, he castigated those who could have helped him and buddied up with those of questionable repute. You’d think if he really wanted to change the world, he’d garner influence from those who ran things. It seemed not to be in his DNA.
What’s worse, he elevated the lowest of the low as the preeminent example of the character of faith. In short, he liked kids more than they were worth. Now, children ministries love to tell stories of how Jesus welcomed children. So sweet, wasn’t he? Bless these little ones. To be fair, it was genuine, but it’s used too much as a photo-op. Once again, The Son of God played for an impact that was beyond the surface.
Children in the first century were not always valued. In their early years, they required considerable care that had little return, for the death rate among the young was high. Why have emotional investment in those who could very well die before they could work and be profitable? Children were the least among the lesser ones of status. They could not speak, work, or carry any influence to further the cause. Beyond that, the Jews knew pagan cults were not beyond stealing children for slavery or sexual molestation, even child-sacrifice. Surviving childhood was almost a miracle. Don’t wrap your life around them.
It’s almost silly how one day his followers were arguing who would be the greatest in heaven. These guys were losers from the start, and now they pictured themselves in some kind of celestial hierarchy. Just goes to show what a crowd around your leader can do for you. But Jesus calls a child to his side, saying, “Anyone who welcomes a little child like this on my behalf welcomes me…Whoever is the least among you is the greatest.” (Luke 9:46-48) Huh? These whining brats? Dear Lord, what are you getting at?
Yep, he chose losers, and were they ever a drag around his neck. A simple lesson that had to be repeated. Another time, parents were turned away when they tried to bring their kids near so Jesus could touch and bless them. His followers only saw that as a bother. Jesus noticed and wouldn’t have it. Hear the frustrated, measured anger in his voice: “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Anyone who doesn’t have their kind of faith will never get into the Kingdom of God.” (Luke 18:16-17) Slammed again!
Losers were a drag around his neck all the time. Even so, you can tell he loved them by how he often called his followers. “Dear children, it is very hard to enter the Kingdom of Heaven…” (Mark 10:24) “Put your trust in the light while there is still time; then you will become children of the light.” (John 12:36) “Dear children, I will be with you only a little longer. (John 13:33) “God blesses those who work for peace, for they will be called the children of God.” (Matthew 5:9) “In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:45) He spoke and taught losers as children, and he loved them.
Jesus called children unto himself knowing they innately have the most simple, unadulterated trust which love requires as its basis. In effect, he loved then the unlovable. With another reversal that slams into the center of social and cultural values, he demonstrated that all persons who would be loved by God have that which makes them unlovable and certainly are not generally thought to be among the greatest.
But to be loved by this Son of God, one must become counted among the child-like losers.
They had no idea what they were getting into when he had recruited them for his purposes. Some say they weren’t the brightest bulbs on the street. The only attribute which spoke most for them was they were teachable…
You Christians! If ever there a more divisive movement in history, it’s yours! You people just can’t stay together. You guys just keep fighting among yourselves and splitting up and moving off in different directions. If you don’t like what’s going on in your church, you take your money and walk. Sometimes, a whole group of you jump ship and make your own deal somewhere else. There’s enough of this kind of thing going on; why would we ever need religion to show us how it’s done? May your God help you.
No greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for friends, is to daily relinquish the right to one’s self in service for others.
The Trouble with Jesus: His words grow like a vine, thin trails of thought getting thicker with meaning.
Awww, so sweet. A story about a good shepherd and his sheep. I can see now the old, faded pictures of this Jesus-figure carrying his lambs. Like really, what does this have to do with today? We left this kind of thing in the nursery with Mary’s little lamb. Baa-baa to you.
Every single one of them did it. When they heard the news, they didn’t believe it. Don’t blame them. We are no different. To be honest, it helps. It helps a lot, for if the report was swallowed hook, line, and sinker as the fishermen they were, it’d be pretty evident this story was falsified with some ulterior purpose in mind, like fashioned to make themselves into some kind of holy heroes. Not how it happened. They didn’t believe it, plain and simple.
Could it be that faith is not actually a fully convinced mindset? Could it be that to truly have faith an element of doubt, perceptions that rest in possibly not as much as possibly so, is necessary? Do faith and doubt exist not as opposites but as integral parts of each other?
How do you get out of bed in the morning when the day is still shrouded in darkness? How do you rise when grief, anger, and anxious fear sink deep into your soul? Why should you open your eyes to a pain that pierces whatever faith that is left? Somehow, they did.
. Before Jesus even got into town, they lined the road, spreading a carpet of coats and shouting, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord.” Expectations were high. If only he had come to fulfill them....With too much popularity and too many attacks on the powers-that-be, Jesus wasn’t making it easy on himself. Sooner or later, someone was going to put a stop to this. As it was, it wasn’t just one.
It’s hard to allow the less attractive parts of ourselves be exposed, let alone the parts which stink, with warts, bunions, and fungus embedded in the nails. Equally difficult is to accept it from one of whom we think so highly, even worship.... Worse yet, maybe they know us better than we think, better than we know ourselves. Their goodness shouldn’t be sullied with our mean stuff, the secret knowledge of ourselves.
Why does God have to come so close?
