A Reflection for Saturday of the Thirtieth Week in Strange Time
Find today’s readings.
“For everybody who exalts himself will probably be humbled, however the one who humbles himself will probably be exalted.” (Lk 14:11)
When my children were young, they watched “Sesame Street”enthralled with a neighborhood where, between gobbling up cookies and singing, lessons about being human were taught. The ability of commentary was an important skill to develop, and so the song “Certainly one of this stuff shouldn’t be like the opposite” challenged young viewers to note patterns. In a grown-up version, we would say this skill is key, because in discerning patterns there may be the opportunity of latest meaning being revealed.
Why am I talking about “Sesame Street”? As I read today’s Scriptures, I heard that song in my head. I had noticed a repeated pattern: the admonition that exalting oneself is to be avoided, because it can inevitably result in being humbled. This teaching will need to have been repeated often by Jesus’ friends. Luke includes it in two chapters (14 and 18), and Matthew does as well (23:12). 3 times we’re taught this similar phrase, which likely comes from a text preserving Jesus’ sayings that students hypothesize Luke and Matthew each knew. And yes, we repeat it too, because what it calls out is so recognizable. It’s all there: the obsessiveness with celebrity culture, the illusion of belonging by insisting on exclusivity, and the idiot’s gold of consumerism and standing. Put Luke’s Gospel in our time and the people within the story are taking selfies and elbowing each other out of the best way within the futile popularity contest that is way of up to date life.
Too many individuals won’t surrender the immediate seat of honor (profit) unless they’ll see what’s in it for them. How will we motivate them to do the appropriate thing anyway?
But there may be yet one more pattern within the readings. This pattern discloses that neither Jesus, Paul nor the evangelists hold much hope that folks’s fondness for pondering only of themselves is more likely to subside any time soon; thus, they bend to fulfill them halfway. It’s not a lot “When you can’t beat them, join them,” because it is “How do I put this so that you is perhaps motivated to do it?” There’s Paul, admitting that he’s willing to take the proclamation of the excellent news of Jesus from wherever it comes, even when it could come from “pretense” and from people motivated by “envy and rivalry” (Phil 1:15)! After which there’s Jesus, who doesn’t appear to expect his audience to make the leap into humility in a single sitting, so he eases them into it by giving them a double incentive. First, the very last thing they need: humiliation and “embarrassment.” Imagine being told to maneuver to the bottom table! Then the thing that they do want: the opportunity of reward. When you do the appropriate thing and no less than act humbly, then you definately is perhaps singled out by the host for a spot of honor! I don’t think Jesus is blind to the glaring contradiction in his story. He’s just practical; fake it ’til you make it.
I find this pattern, due cognizant of individuals’s limitations, inviting at a time when we’d like solutions to urgent problems. We simply don’t have time to attend for people to develop an ethical backbone. We’d like to avoid wasting our common home now, and we should be as realistic as Paul, Jesus, Luke and Matthew. Automotive corporations could make a lot of money in the event that they sell us electric vehicles. Manufacturers can fill their coffers transitioning to energy-efficient technologies. Farmers might be rewarded for not using pesticides with good prices and healthy labeling. They are going to get what they need, and we would heal our planet somewhat in the method. Too many individuals won’t surrender the immediate seat of honor (profit) unless they’ll see what’s in it for them. How will we motivate them to do the appropriate thing anyway?
Jesus explains that the shortcoming to be repaid is the one way we will make real the gracious love of God, emphasizing his hope that folks be truly selfless. While we work on that selflessness, possibly we will discover a middle ground to perform the urgent things our world needs. Now. Even when, as Jesus says, it could start out being for the flawed reasons.
