“And the Award Goes To…” Christ Collides With Our Priorities
Sometimes, when I get writer’s block, I have to start small to get back in the rhythm of regular writing. Apologies to those of you at Immanuel who already heard my sermon yesterday, but I’m going to share it in written form here (especially since a few of you have asked for notes). You can listen to the sermon here (starting at 47 minutes) or read along below.
When I was growing up, my very practical parents allowed themselves a splurge in the grocery checkout line: People magazine. Our family was working middle class with a healthy skepticism about rich folks and yet, we loved flipping through pages of runway gowns, Hollywood gossip and noteworthy achievers. Just recently, I watched the Oscars and the SAG (Screen Actors Guild) awards, listening to the speeches, laughing at the jokes, wanting to understand the glittering world of the very few.
There is something unquestionably magnetic about those whom are world celebrates, admires, gives airtime to, prioritizes in funds and fame.
In the Anabaptist Community Bible, the heading for Jesus’ parable collection in Luke 15 is “Occasions for Celebration.” Jesus is literally celebrating with tax collectors and sinner– he’s at the afterparty with the crew– and the Pharisees and legal experts were doing what they’ve done best since the beginning of human institutions: grumbling
Jesus tells three stories with three seekers to this gathering of those thought to be on the inside and outside of the kingdom of God: a shepherd who looks for a lost sheep, a woman who looks for a lost coin, and a father who looks for two lost sons.
The actions of these three seekers draw scrutiny because they rub against ideas of who or what the community should attend to and eventually celebrate. Who is most worth it? A question our world is constantly asking and Lent is a great time to wrestle with it. The worship guide Immanuel has been using to guide our services this season gives this week of Lent the theme, “Christ Collides With Our Priorities.”
The Merriam Webster Dictionary defines “priorities” as “the right to one's attention before other things considered less important.”
Other synonyms are “preference, urgency, and supremacy”
The word “right” suggests that things or people that are prioritized have something inherent in them that has a claim on us. Not just a claim but a weight that judges anything else as less.
Who or what do we see God prefer, rush to aid, declare supreme, or judge as most important? Who or what has a claim to our attention?
In Scripture and in the ongoing kingdom of God on earth, I would argue it is most often not the same people or practices that would be deemed as “best” and “occasions for celebration” in the world at large.
In an article I read this week about Fundraising for NGOs, there was a list of possible priorities for grantors who give out money…how they decide who gets limited resources and affirmation. These were some of the examples:
Close Mission Alignment
Specific Geographic Focus
Tangible results and outcomes
Enhancement of an organization’s infrastructure
Innovation
Sustainability
Capacity for Evaluation
Financial Stability and Accountability
And marketing brand developer AMW suggests that the priorities of someone who wants to on the pages of People or the stage at the Oscars (i.e. famous) should be:
Talent and Skill
Visibility and Exposure
Network and Connections
Public Image and Branding
Timing and Opportunity
I would suggest that Jesus’ stories and interactions in Luke (and throughout the Gospels) indicate that most of his favorite projects and people wouldn’t get the grant or the Genius Award or the Emmy. I am going to quickly go through each of these “priorities,” and I want you to listen if you can hear the contrast between them and what Jesus says or does:
•Close Mission Alignment VS
Luke 15:29 “But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!”
•Specific Geographic Focus VS
•Luke 4: 24 “Truly I tell you,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown. I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time…Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon.”
•Tangible results and outcomes VS
•Luke 13: 7 So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil? “‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year…”
•Enhancement of an organization’s infrastructure VS
Luke 9: 49 “Master,” said John, “we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we tried to stop him, because he is not one of us.” “Do not stop him,” Jesus said, “for whoever is not against you is for you.”
•Innovation VS
•Luke 15:8 “Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Doesn’t she light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it?
•Luke 13:30 Indeed there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.”
•Sustainability VS
Luke 9: 3 He told them: “Take nothing for the journey—no staff, no bag, no bread, no money, no extra shirt. Whatever house you enter, stay there until you leave that town.
Luke 15:3 Then Jesus told them this parable: “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it?
•Capacity for Evaluation VS
•Luke 6:32 “And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? …but love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back.”
•Financial Stability and Accountability VS
Luke 16: Jesus told his disciples: “There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. So he called him in… ‘What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management…(Insert creative accounting)
“The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly.”
•Talent and Skill VS
•Luke 20:46 “Beware of the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. These men will be punished most severely.”
•Visibility and Exposure VS
Luke 5:15- Yet the news about him spread all the more, so that crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses. But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.
•Network and Connections VS
•Luke 14:12 “Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or sisters, your relatives, or your rich neighbors…But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed.”
•Public Image and Branding VS
•Luke 15:1 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”
•Luke 9: 58 “Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.” In other words, there has never been a “Jesus Tower.”
•Timing and Opportunity VS
•Luke 8:53 They laughed at him, knowing that she was dead. But he took her by the hand and said, “My child, get up!” Her spirit returned, and at once she stood up… Her parents were astonished, but he ordered them not to tell anyone what had happened.
I believe if Jesus was in charge of handing out awards, his would be very different than the ones gathering dust on the “most worthy” shelves. I imagined this in my art up in the sanctuary this week, the types of awards would be handed out in the kingdom. What if our best achievements are nothing more than toilet paper papier mache “mummies” stuffing our world’s stuffy tombs?
What or who is getting recognized in Heaven with the real prizes? Here are a few I came up with:
Least Sexy Idea
Messiest
Least Quantifiable Results
Least Likely to Make the News
Weakest
Slowest Progress
Least Likely to Succeed
Traditional
Newfangled and Might Not Work
Lamest
Saddest
One Step Forward, Three Steps Back
Still Going
In a book I’m currently reading on child liberation theology The Kingdom of Children, R.L. Stollar writes this:
“The kingdom of God is at hand, it is good news, and it belongs to children. Will we follow Jesus’s example and lift up and center children? Will we do the hard work of making our homes, our families, our churches, our schools, and our communities accessible and supportive of every child? Will we speak out prophetically against adultism and childism*, naming them as the direct threats to the gospel of Jesus that they are?”
*For a deeper dive into what “adultism” and “childism” mean, you can read this or do your own research.
In my mind, you could change “children” in this example with any of those who our society has deprioritized, devalued, and dismissed.
I want to challenge us this week to think about children and these groups whom the world considers less important, less deserving of our attention, finances, time and honor. I want us to think about our own projects and programs, too.
May we rightly name and work for and speak on behalf of the priorities of Christ and hope to hold the accolades that actually matter to God. Amen.
