In our world, marketing is an art. Swaying your opinions is a science. Advertisers look to combine the two and
create something that grabs your attention, holds it even if briefly, and
implants a message that you should like the product they sell. If they cannot make you like it, perhaps they
can make you curious about it. If they
cannot make you curious, perhaps they can have you associate feelings with
it. The packaging of a message has
become the way we tend to judge the message itself. Imagine trying to sell a pizza in a cardboard
box with a car tire track/print clearly running diagonally across the top of
the box. Seeing a tire track across the
box, would make you think this pizza was run over, and is probably crushed
inside. No one would want it. Imagine attempting to sell soda inside a
dented, scratched, and bruised up soda can. You would naturally think this soda can will
have way too much pressure in it, and when you open it, it will explode. Even if you could secure the contents without
incident, the packaging would make you think that the can had “been through the
mill”. It would do little to inspire
confidence in the quality of the drink.
People get used to seeing packaging of a certain type for
the products they buy. When the
packaging does not match the historical expectations of what it should look
like, it draws attention, but most often negative attention. It is like introducing a third wheel on a
motorcycle. At first no one sees the
value in this, and then a niche market is carved out in biker clubs for the
unusual, or as utility in a side cart.
Surely no one would introduce a fourth wheel, but then they do. And voila, the All-Terrain Vehicle (ATV) is
born. But wasn’t that a Jeep? No, the ATV is a motorcycle on 4 wheels,
exposing you, the rider, to all of nature’s elements including massive injury
if it rolls, or throws you from its grasp at high speed. And yet the ATV market continues to
grow. Just like the idea of putting a
motorcycle on the water, and voila, the watercraft market is born and thrives
as well. It would seem there is no limit
to how we could apply the principles of a basic motorcycle with a little
imagination.
And while we are now open to seeing perhaps a new kind of
airplane based on a motorcycle given its rapid recent evolution; we are not so
open in church. All too many Christians,
expect to see their leaders in a certain kind of package; a three-piece suit to
be exact, something with a tie, and shiny shoes. A deacon, or deaconess can get away with
small variances. But elders hardly
can. And a pastor, is chained to this
image of appropriate packaging as surely as they are, to carry a Bible with
them at all times. And using your phone
is a cheat, you must have a printed red-letter edition King James Bible, if you
are to claim the title of preacher or pastor in this day-and-age. Packaging sold to us by tradition. Packaging in sync with our ideas about doing
our best for God, but out of sync with what Jesus wore. Even in His day, Jesus did not wear fine
clothing. He only wore clean clothing,
certainly a by-product of baptizing so many people in the Jordan river.
Jesus did not take much of an interest in fine
clothing. In fact, he must have shunned
it, at least for Himself. It would have
been remarkably easy to ask for it, from His followers. They would have either given to Him, or
secured it through taking up an offering, like so many modern ministers do
believing this is the only way to secure the Lords favor. It’s not.
Only at His death, is Jesus finally given a royal robe to wear, for the
purposes of mocking the King of the Jews.
This is the robe the soldiers eventually gamble for as it still has
value, even when Jesus dies above them.
But somehow, modern Christians cling to the idea, that simple, and clean
are not enough. Practical … for hands-on
ministry to the poor and to the diseased never even enter our minds. By this logic we would all be better off
wearing scrubs. With disposable clothing
we could embrace the poor, and hug the sick, throwing away our scrubs later and
buying new ones if they could not be cleaned in the wash.
But then, scrubs are not the most flattering of
garments. And our ministries are not
designed for physical contact with those in need. Our ministries are designed only for the
listening ear, and contributing wallet.
So we expect 3-piece suit packaging, complete with tie, and shiny
shoes. Should a minister take the pulpit
dressed in cargo shorts and a short-sleeved shirt with tennis shoes, we would
rise up of one accord and throw him out.
Or at minimum, remove ourselves from the blasphemy that is sure to occur
in a place that would permit this. But
it is not only clothing that marks our acceptance of a messenger of His
truth. It is behavior. We have standards after all. Biblical standards (or at least our
interpretation of what those might be).
And we rigidly enforce our standards on everyone … including … Jesus.
Matthew marks the beginning of this thinking (or at least
one of the first times it was publicly exposed) in his gospel in the ninth
chapter picking up in verse 9 saying … “And as Jesus passed forth from thence,
he saw a man, named Matthew, sitting at the receipt of custom: and he saith
unto him, Follow me. And he arose, and followed him.” As Jesus is leaving his home country or city,
He sees Matthew engaged in the practice of collecting Roman taxes. This is the MOST hated position in the entire
nation. The guy who cleans the poo out
of the swine pen would be considered high-society, compared to a tax collector. Tax collectors are thieves by
profession. Even if they do not steal
more for themselves (which most do), they steal Israelite wealth and transfer
it to Roman coffers by the nature of what they do.
Asking Matthew to become a disciple, was literally like
asking public enemy number one, to become one of your chief ambassadors. No thinking modern minister would ask a
deformed, lesbian, overweight, stuttering, loud-mouthed, aging minority woman, dressed
in shorts and a tee shirt with bare-feet, full of skin disease, and right up to
the last minute, a thief of everything you owned, person … to come and follow
them, and secure a prime place in your ministry for Christ. The packaging is ALL wrong. Any one of those things could perhaps be OK,
but the entire combination would make them public enemy number one in the
Christian community. To make them an
Apostle of Jesus Christ, is simply unthinkable.
This was the emotional equivalent of selecting a Roman tax collector in
the time of Christ. Matthew would begin
his discipleship with Christ as the MOST hated man of the 12, and of the nation
at large. And what does this hated man
do … he invites Jesus and the others to come dine in his home.
Matthew continues in verse 10 saying … “And it came to pass,
as Jesus sat at meat in the house, behold, many publicans and sinners came and
sat down with him and his disciples.”
The friends of the hated, are hated themselves. Matthew opens up his home not only to Jesus,
to but too everyone else that would be willing to dine there. His friends are the dregs of society. Prostitutes, beggars, whoremongers, other
thieves, even a gentile or Roman or two.
The list of people willing to associate with the most hated, are by
nature also hated themselves. Though on
the social scale, Matthew is clearly the worst, the lowest, and the most hated
of any of these groups. They all serve a
purpose. Matthew and tax collectors
serve only Rome. None the less, Jesus
comes and dines with them all.
Matthew continues in verse 11 saying … “And when the
Pharisees saw it, they said unto his disciples, Why eateth your Master with
publicans and sinners?” Enter organized
religion into the story. Enter centuries
of tradition passed down within the church, even if they are wrong, or
misguided … they remain traditions. The
behavior of Jesus was simply unacceptable.
His behavior rules Him out as being our Messiah. How many things do you do in your church, or
church service, because you have always done them that way? How many rules and burdens have been placed
upon you from the organized church, having nothing to do with the example of
Jesus Christ, that you follow because someone said you should? And when the pastor says you should, how many
search the life of Christ, and through this lens, the scriptures for themselves
to see if what even a pastor says is what really should happen? We don’t.
We don’t take the time. We just
do what we are told, as sheep are known to do.
Matthew continues in verse 12 saying … “But when Jesus heard
that, he said unto them, They that be whole need not a physician, but they that
are sick. [verse 13] But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy,
and not sacrifice: for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to
repentance.” Yikes! Questioning the need for the sacrificial
system itself in favor of mercy, was tantamount to blaspheming Moses and the
history of that system that Jesus setup in the first place. But then, Jesus setup that system because we
care little for mercy, and so are in need of sacrifice to remind our hardened
hearts what mercy should be. To kill the
innocent animals, was supposed to be hard for us to do. It was supposed to be a reminder that the
mercy we feel for the innocent would one day take the Saviors life for us
all. Because we prefer sin to
mercy. Because we prefer the love of
self, to the love of others. And in this
preference, our mercy wanes. And we are
ALL unrighteous. And we ALL have need of
the mercy of our Lord to save us from ourselves. Jesus reminds us that mercy underwrites our
very salvation.
If the incident or the story ended here, we might feel good
being able to criticize only the religious leadership of the establishment,
about their narrow ideas of packaging, and their hypocrisy. But even the fringe have ideas about
packaging as well. The fringe folks of
our community look down on 3-piece suits as being haughty, as being
condescending, as being un-enlightened with what is truly important. The fringe folks have their own music, and
methods, and ideas. And as they rebel
against the establishment, they become like the pilgrims of our ancestry who
fled religious persecution, only to establish it themselves. The fringe folks harden in their own ideas
about what is important, and become inflexible to change, or adapt to something
new. And it is like looking at two sides
of the same coin; both chained to the metal of insistence of being right that binds
them.
Matthew continues in verse 14 saying … “Then came to him the
disciples of John, saying, Why do we and the Pharisees fast oft, but thy
disciples fast not?” John the Baptist
was definitely NOT mainstream Israelite society. He dressed weird. He ate weird foods. His hair was uncut. He bellowed messages of repentance and
baptized people under that banner in the river Jordan. This was not the Rabbi you followed for a
traditional experience. This was the
fringe. The out there, the weirdo of the
church. He fit no mold. Yet he and his followers maintained a few
traditions like fasting. And as they
observed Jesus, they begin to see the unfairness of them fasting all the time,
and the followers of Jesus never fasting at all. It bothers them. Even from a fringe perspective the packaging
begins to look wrong. Both the organized
Pharisee and the fringe disciple of John are questioning the same thing … could
the packaging of Christ that is different from both indicate He is not actually
the Messiah?
Matthew continues in verse 15 saying … “And Jesus said unto
them, Can the children of the bridechamber mourn, as long as the bridegroom is
with them? but the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from
them, and then shall they fast. [verse 16] No man putteth a piece of new cloth
unto an old garment, for that which is put in to fill it up taketh from the
garment, and the rent is made worse. [verse 17] Neither do men put new wine
into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the
bottles perish: but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved.” Jesus tells both audiences the same message,
what He brings is new, it is a new life.
The traditions that burden us were never supposed to be there as
burdens. They were meant to free us, or we
should be rid of them. Fasting is not
meant as a burden, but as a tool, to clear the mind to see the will of God
clearer … or not at all. Association
with the dregs of society is not a sin, it is meant to show them love from a
God of love, not to become them and like them participating in the same sins
they are held captive to.
It is the love of Jesus that can free us from who we are,
whether traditional Christian or fringe Christian. Our freedom is not found in how we package
ourselves, but in how much we love others, and burn to make their lives
better. How much we burn to point others
to Jesus as the way to escape the pain of their lives, is the basis of our
freedom, nothing else. His mercy defines
our freedom, nothing else. When we love,
we remove the need for sacrifice. When
all our minds are consumed with love of others, there is no room for sin to
enter in. Better that kind of love, then
a cycle of sin-and-forgive we are content with today. Better to love others so much, we do not have
time to sin, we do not have desire to sin, we only want to see people find the
love of Jesus Christ. It is not up to us
to clean them, that is the work of Jesus.
It is not up to us to judge them for who they are today, but instead to
point them to Jesus and have faith that He will clean them up over time. Jesus is not just looking to meet someone,
and then turn over their salvation to you.
He is looking to meet them, love them everyday, and see them freed from
pain of sin. That is what salvation is
all about.
Does it bother you that Jesus does this in a homespun
garment and simple sandals? Does it
bother you that Jesus gets dirty on dusty roads? Does it bother you that Jesus picks up all
kinds of germs as he embraces the lepers, the demon possessed, the crippled,
the folks with diseases of the skin and bloody wounds? It is not clean work healing the folks in
need. Love is not clean, it is
messy. Love that redeems is messy
to. It has to be, to get to the place
where you are, and remove you from it.
The Truth has a name. It comes to
us from the inspiration of His Holy Spirit still today. Even if it is not wrapped in the package we
traditionally accept, we can still listen for His Truth even when the person
who offers it, may not be perfect yet.
It was never the package that mattered.
It is not the 3-piece suit that lends credence to what is said. Only the content of what is said, can be
measured against the Truth of Jesus Christ.
A lot of lies are said in 3-piece suits, just as they are in cargo
shorts and tee shirts. But a lot of
truths are offered in both as well.
Let us open our minds to His Spirit, focus on it, and
discard the package for what it is … meaningless. It was not the homespun robe and simple dusty
sandals that gave Christ His passion for us, and they did nothing to deter it
either. All they were, was clothing,
nothing more. No significance. What He said matters, not in what clothing He
said it. The same is true today of ALL
of His messengers to us. Truth still has
a name. And Truth can still come to us
from the most unlikely sources, if we will but see it. Leave the packaging up to the influence of
His Spirit, and focus only on the Truth that is uttered. If Jesus is in it, the package is
meaningless. But if Jesus is not in it,
no matter how well it is packaged, it is still worth nothing. Jesus reminds us, if we want to do our best for
Him, we should show mercy, and love others. The recipients of that mercy and love will be looking
in to your eyes, not at their reflection in your shiny shoes, or at the wrinkles
in your cargo shorts. Your eyes will reveal
your passion … or not.
