Devotion and Pragmatism

Matthew 26:6-13

Now when Jesus was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, a woman came up to him with an alabaster flask of very expensive ointment, and she poured it on his head as he reclined at table. And when the disciples saw it, they were indignant, saying, “Why this waste? For this could have been sold for a large sum and given to the poor.” But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why do you trouble the woman? For she has done a beautiful thing to me. For you always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me. In pouring this ointment on my body, she has done it to prepare me for burial. Truly, I say to you, wherever this gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.”

Tom Wright, Matthew for Everyone (Vol. 2)

Here is a dinner party, the last supper before the Last Supper; and here is an unnamed woman whose love for Jesus has overflowed, quite literally, in an act of needless beauty, like a stunning alpine flower growing unobserved half a mile up a rock face. Of course, some people always want to pick such flowers and make them do something useful—to grow them in a garden at home, perhaps, to make a profit. God’s creation isn’t like that, and nor is devotion to Jesus. When people start to be captivated by him, and by his path to the cross, the love this produces is given to extravagance (148).

Aaron Orendorff

Devotion and pragmatism make for uncomfortable companions. It isn’t that devotion to Jesus shuns wisdom, or that it looks down on shrewdness—after all, the central burden of chapters 24 and 25 was to outline the way the true wisdom ought to go. Instead, the point in this brief and often perplexing story is that devotion to Jesus—particularly as it relates to his crucifixion, death and burial—will often appear foolish—needlessly and wastefully extravagant—even to other disciples.

What sort of reckless extravagance is your devotion to Jesus calling you to?

How is the way of the cross shaping that extravagant devotion?

Beware the “Beautiful Things”

For obvious (political) reasons, last year Shane Clairborne & Chris Haw’s ironically titled Jesus for President: Politics for Ordinary Radicals was one of the most popular Christian books on the market. It’s a pretty fast read, thanks especially to the book’s relentless graphic design (check the web-site out, you'll see what I mean). The book wasn’t without its share of controversy, but as I was preparing this week’s message on the topic of idolatry, I remembered the following quote:

It’s the beautiful things that get us. Perhaps the greatest seduction is not the ANTI-GOD, but the ALMOST*GOD. Poisonous fruit can look pretty tasty. That’s what is so dangerous about ideas like FREEDOM, PEACE AND JUSTICE. They are all seductive qualities, close to the heart of God. After all, it’s the beautiful things we kill and die for. And it’s the beautiful we market, exploit, brand and counterfeit.

WE FIND OURSELVES POSSESSED BY OUR POSSESSIONS . . .

and enslaved by the pursuit of freedom. Nations fighting for peace end up perpetuating the very violence they seek to destroy. Serpents are slippery and slimy things.

MOST of the ugliness in the human narrative comes from a distorted quest to possess beauty. COVETING begins with appreciating blessing. MURDER begins with a hunger for justice. LUST begins with a recognition of beauty. GLUTTONY begins when our enjoyment of the delectable gifts of GOD starts to consume us. IDOLATRY begins when our seeing a reflection of God in something beautiful leads to our thinking that the beautiful image bearer is worthy of WORSHIP (pg. 26).

The Least of These

Matthew 25:31-33, 40, 45-46

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. . . . And the King will answer them [that is, the sheep, the righteous, those ‘blessed by my Father’], ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ . . . Then he will answer them [that is, the goats, the ‘cursed’], saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Tom Wright, Matthew for Everyone (Vol. 2)

Justice is one of the most profound longings of the human race. If there is no justice, then deep within ourselves we know that something is out of joint. Justice is hard to define and harder still to put into practice; but that has never stopped human beings and societies seeking it, praying for it, and working to find ways of doing it better. And justice doesn’t simply mean “punishing wickedness,” though that is regularly involved. It means bringing the world back into balance.

Central to the Jewish and Christian traditions . . . is the belief that this passionate longing for justice comes from the creator God himself. Jews and Christians believe that he will eventually do justice on a worldwide scale . . . . God’s judgment will be seen to be just. The world will be put to rights.

Part of the biblical image of the coming of the son of man is the announcement that justice will at last be done (141).

Aaron Orendorff

We are never more like Jesus than when we care—both for and about—people for whom the world has no use. “The least of these,” which occurs twice in this passage, is a polite, though unmistakable reference to those people who, in and of themselves, have nothing to offer, nothing to contribute, nothing to add to society’s life. They may even be those who actually subtract from the relationships they enter. This subtraction may be economic, emotional or temporal; but whatever its nature, Jesus’ emphasis is clear: you attitude towards these people—these insignificant people—is a direct reflection of your attitude toward me.

Why is that?

The answer lies in the nature of the gospel itself. Jesus—in both his incarnation of crucifixion—become (literally become) the very “least of these.” And he did so in order to reach the very people he identified himself with.

“I was afraid.”

Matthew 25:24-30

“He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.’ But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sowed and gather where I scattered no seed? Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents. For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’”

Aaron Orendorff

The opening line of v. 25 creates an interesting twist on what appears to be one of the driving themes of chapters 24-25: fear. “I was afraid,” the “wicked and slothful servant” tells his master: Fear kept me from faithful service. As the third parable in a series of four all of which end with a stark warning involving one form or another of “weeping and gnashing of teeth,” it seems odd for the unfaithful servant to be the one supposedly motivated by fear.

What was it then that the servant feared?

V. 24 explains: “Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed . . .”

What the servant feared was not justice, but injustice. What he feared was the unreasoning harshness of an crooked master, the cruelty of a slave-driver who demands of his servants what is not rightfully his. This is far from the picture Jesus is trying to develop.

It is not therefore fear that miscarried the servant’s work, but a wrong understanding of the master with whom he dealt. Again, Jesus is providing an example of folly set over and against a clear picture of wisdom. The point, therefore, is not changed, merely clarified. Our understanding of God shapes how we fear Him, which in turn shapes how we serve.

“I do not know you”

Matthew 25:1-4, 10-13

“Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps. . . . And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’ But he answered, ‘Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.’ Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.”

Tom Wright, Matthew for Everyone (Vol. 2)

Even more obviously than the previous one, this story is rooted in the Jewish tradition of contrasting wisdom with folly—being sensible with being silly. . . . It’s probably wrong to try and guess what the oil in the story “stands for” . . . . It isn’t that kind of story. Within the world of the story itself, it simply means being ready for the key moment. . . . What matters is being ready; being prepared; being wise; thinking ahead, realizing that a crisis is coming sooner or later and that if you don’t make preparations now, and keep them in good shape in the meantime, you’ll wish you had (133-4).

Aaron Orendorff

Again, Jesus starts his story: “Then the kingdom of heaven will be like . . .” Again, he contrasts the wise with the foolish. Again, fear (the right kind of fear, the fear of being unknown by the bridegroom, of being ill-prepared and forever outside) is used to distinguish the end of the wise from the end of the foolish.

The thought then that ought to be ringing in our ears is this: prepare now because one day it will be too late.

There’s no way to say this (nor to write this) without sounding like a wide-eyed, pulpit-pounding, hellfire-and-brimstone fundamentalist. Yet this is where Jesus leads us (again and again); and so (we must conclude) this is where Jesus wants us to be.

Fear and the Wise Servant

Matthew 24:45-51

“Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that wicked servant says to himself, ‘My master is delayed,’ and begins to beat his fellow servants and eats and drinks with drunkards, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

Tom Wright, Matthew for Everyone (Vol. 2)

The difference between the two types of slaves—the one who kept watch and did what he should, and the one who forgot what he was about and did the opposite—isn’t just the difference between good and bad, between obedience and disobedience. It’s the difference between wisdom and folly. . . . If the living God might knock at the door at any time, wisdom means being ready at any time. . . . Wisdom consists not least, now, in realizing that the world has turned a corner with the coming of Jesus and that we must always be ready to give an account of ourselves.

Of course these warnings are held within the larger picture of the gospel, in which Jesus embodies the love of God which goes out freely to all and sundry. Of course we shall fail. Of course there will be times when we shall go to sleep on the job. Part of being a follower of Jesus is not that we always get everything right, but that, like Peter among others, we quickly discover where we are going wrong, and take steps to put it right (130-1).

Aaron Orendorff

Fear is without a doubt one of the most powerful motivational forces in our lives. In a hundred different ways, fear drives us, directs us, prompts us, compels us. Our problem with fear, however, isn’t fear itself; it’s what we fear.

Jesus’ point here is simple: what (or perhaps better, who) we should fear is God. It’s no accident, as Wright points out, that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (Pro. 9:10). Wisdom consists in taking a right view of the world, of seeing things as they really are (not as they appear nor, as is often the case, the way they feel). Faithfulness to the work at hand and wisdom to see things aright go hand in hand. It’s only as we reverently cultivate a genuine “fear of the Lord” that we are made fit for the kingdom work that the Master of the house has prepared for us.

Be Ready

Matthew 24:36 & 44

But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. . . . Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.

Tom Wright, Matthew for Everyone (Vol. 2)

The warning was primarily directed to the situation of dire emergency in the first century, after Jesus’ death and resurrection and before his words about the Temple came true. But they ring through subsequent centuries, and into our own day. We too live in turbulent and dangerous times. Who knows what will happen next week, next year? It’s up to each church, and each individual Christian, to answer the question: are you ready? Are you awake? (127-8)

The Point(s) of the Son Appearing

Matthew 24:29-31, 34-35

Immediately after the tribulation of those days:

the sun will be darkened,
and the moon will not give its light,
and the stars will fall from heaven,
and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. . . . Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

Aaron Orendorff

Whatever our particular opinion on what the events Jesus describes here in Matthew 24-25 refer to—whether they find their primarily referent within the life span of the disciples (v. 34) or beyond—the primarily thrust of Jesus’ teaching must not be overlooked. Three simple points—easy to define, but hard to actually live beneath—are being made. First, Jesus wins. Second, Jesus—in both his first and second coming—is the center of history. Third, Jesus’ words are true. These points are not hard in the sense of being uncomfortable or difficult to cope with; rather, their hardness stems from the weakness of our faith and our ever present desire to make ourselves the winners, the center of history and the last and final word. The most humbling truths are always the most precious.