Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem; we’re getting closer to the cross and Jesus’ teaching takes on a new
urgency, with a focus on the coming of kingdom of heaven. On the way to
Jerusalem, the brothers James and John approach Jesus, asking to be given
places of honour beside him. Jesus calls them together and says, “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the
Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over
them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be
your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For
even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his
life as a ransom for many." Jesus is about serving the other: God,
your neighbour, even your enemy, because this is what shapes and changes your
heart attitude into the same attitude Jesus has.
Jesus emphasizes the importance of humility, servanthood, and responsibility over power, authority, and entitlement
that the world so often prioritizes. This is the reality of sin’s influence in
the world; sin separates and divides while Jesus seeks to bring unity and a
culture of humility and building into each other, just as the Father builds
into the Son and Spirit, the Son builds into the Father and Spirit, and the
Spirit builds into the Father and Son to create the perfect example of unity
and outward focus.
Jesus tells a parable, using a familiar setting,
yet adds a shocking twist. Jesus tells of a Pharisee praying, he’s just
told parable about constantly praying and trusting in God to act. Now he tells
of a praying Pharisee, a common sight. The Pharisees were the holy ones who
practiced the law and acts of piety on behalf of the people. There he stands
tall and confident as he prays, “God, I thank you
that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like
this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.”
The Pharisee reminds God of how special and pious he is compared to everyone
else. It’s rather surprising to those listening to Jesus tell this parable that
the Pharisee would even notice the tax collector. Tax collectors were
considered unclean, so he likely wouldn’t even be in the same area of the
temple as the Pharisee, probably worshipping in the Court of the Gentiles, even
though he’s a Jew. Jesus’ listeners see the Pharisee as the good guy here.
Jesus turns the tables on his listeners, “I tell you that this man, rather than the
other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will
be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” The tax
collector’s too shamed to even lift his head to pray, knowing he’s a sinner and
doesn’t deserve grace or forgiveness, and now Jesus says that attitude and
spirit is what God sees and desires, a humble heart that seeks God’s favour,
unlike the Pharisee who simply tells God he’s special and deserves God’s
blessing, deceiving himself, blind to his need for God’s grace and forgiveness.
Jesus comes from heaven to earth, God's sign
of love and grace. God comes to us even though our tendency is to move away from him. Jesus is with us, living in the world
where real life happens rather than being coddled behind palace walls. God
comes as a child, born in the middle of his people, instead of among the
privileged few. After visiting America, Herman Bavinck reflected on American
Christianity and remarked that it was a very self-centered faith, focusing on
the importance of self, some things never change.
Jesus
comes in humble circumstances so that we can feel free to come to him, knowing that he understands our
lives, with all the messiness, the noise, the dirt, stress, chaos, joy and
excitement life brings; with all of its day-to-day needs and challenges. Jesus
comes to save us from the brokenness of our sin, offering new life of hope and
inner peace even if our outward circumstances don't change. Jesus' salvation
changes us, makes us right with God, filling us with his Spirit, knowing that
he’ll give us the strength and wisdom needed to make it through good and hard
times.
Jesus
acknowledges the faith of the tax collector who knows himself better than the Pharisee,
whose personal insight is blinded by self-importance and pride. In our social
media age, we’re tempted to create lives online that are unrealistic and focus
on how special our lives are, rather than admitting the reality that our daily
lives are filled with normal regular work, study, failures and successes, with
joy and tears, with times of excitement and deep boredom, all the normal things
of life. We’re tempted to be like Pharisees, while Jesus shows us the way of
humility and being real with each other and ourselves. If we try to live up to
our social media images, we risk depression and anxiety, never able to measure
up every day to the special staged moments that we actually share.
Jesus grows up in a small village with all the
other children and families, learning at the synagogue, worshipping with his parents at the temple
at feast times, learning about God his heavenly father, learning a trade to
take care of himself and his family. Jesus doesn't claim the privileges of
being the son of God, he does life with us.
The
apostle Paul writes to the church in Philippi, "In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset
as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with
God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being
found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to
death—even death on a cross! Therefore, God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the
name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the
earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of
God the Father."
The
result of Jesus' humility in doing life as we do, living it like regular people, is that God
exalts him and accepts Jesus' death for our sins. Death now brings us into the
presence of God rather than into punishment. Jesus’ humility leads to his trust
in his Father’s plan of the cross, leading to our justification with the Father
and adoption into the family of God! Humility is a key quality of the kingdom
as it leads us to practice trust and reliance on Jesus and the Holy Spirit
instead of ourselves, helping us to see our need for Jesus, our need for his
guidance and the importance of submitting our lives to obedience to Jesus’ way
over our own way. It brings us to the place where we can be honest with the
reality of the depth of our sin and where we confess our sins with a broken
heart, which leads to repentance and life change instead of just words.
Humility
sees ourselves through the lens of reality instead of desire. Humility
acknowledges the gifts and blessings God’s given us, the abilities and talents
we have. Humility’s about valuing ourselves correctly. One of my professors at
Redeemer University was Al Wolters, a world renown scholar who was willing to
ask us, his students, for copies of our papers, and permission to use our
insights when he learned something from us. He knew he was gifted in his field,
but was humble enough to learn from his students. This is healthy biblical
humility.
Humility rooted in love is at the heart of
following Jesus;
it reflects who Jesus is, how he lived and how he calls us to live. I’ve always
loved the GEMS’ verse in Micah 6:8 “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and
to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” Jesus sees
parents bringing babies to him to be blessed and uses these children as an
example of the humility we’re called to live out. He tells his disciples, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder
them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, anyone
who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”
We know that children can be as proud and
arrogant as adults. We’ve seen children
taunting each other, “My dad’s stronger than your dad,” or “My
parents make more money than yours,” or multiple other ways of showing they
think they’re better than others. Yet children at their heart, depend
completely on their parents for the clothes they wear, the food they eat, the
bed they sleep in, and they completely trust mom and dad to provide for them,
so much so, it’s perfectly natural for them. Jesus challenges us to trust
completely in him, to look to him rather than ourselves for our value, worth,
or identity. It takes humility, a confession that we need to lean on him rather
than ourselves, that we cannot save or even provide for ourselves without
Jesus. When we finally reach that place in our faith, the stress of life
disappears, and we can live in the joy of Jesus without worry, fear, or guilt,
and heed his call to “seek first his kingdom and
his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”
No comments:
Post a Comment