Self Interest doesn't have the Last Word! Good Friday Reflections

 Thoughts on a Good Friday

Good Friday Reflections on Luke 23

This a long introduction, but stay with me.

One of the courses I used to teach was Issues in Economics. This was an upper level seminar style class in which we learned about the basics of economics and then played with various social, political, and moral issues which are impacted by economic theories, practices, and policies. It was always a small group of motivated students and our discussions were usually quite interesting. One young lady’s comment and our ensuing discussion has since stayed with me and become a kind of lense through which I often look at Scripture and my life. 

Without going into great detail, our economic system is based to a great degree on self-interest, the idea that an individual will try to maximize actions to his or her advantage and achieve a greater level of well-being. The theory, roughly, goes that when individuals practice self-interest, other’s well-being will also be enhanced.  The problem comes in when conflicts occur between individual’s self-interests, or when individuals or groups advance their self-interests at the expense of others or the environment. I think you get the idea. But, here is what struck me about this particular discussion. We were getting into the possible pros and cons of this topic when one young lady came out with this. “So, could we say that narrow self-interest was the original sin?” The economics class, just turned into a religion class. (This was a Lutheran high school), and the ensuing discussion became one of the lenses through which I have since read scripture and practice self-examination. 

Enter Good Friday, 2022 and my reading of Luke 23. Here I was struck by the people’s accusations, and the way in which they reflected self-interest. Their argument was that Jesus was disrupting the status quo. His teachings were threatening their sense of how things should be done so that they could maximize their own well-being. The solution? Get rid of this person, misrepresent what he had actually taught.  Do violence to the one who would threaten their self-interest, their power, their comfort, their plans for changing the regime. Look at their accusations and the record ,though.

Accusation: We found this man perverting the nation!

Jesus: (Luke 6:27ff)

Love your enemies - do good to those who hate you - bless those who curse

you - pray for those who abuse you - do good and lend expecting nothing in 

return- be merciful as your Father is merciful.

Accusation: He forbids us to pay taxes to the emperor!

Jesus: (Luke 20:20ff)

Give to the emperor, things that are the emperor’s and to God the things that 

are God’s.

Accusation: He stirs up the people by his teaching!

Jesus: (Matt. 5:9)

Blessed are the peacemakers.

(Luke 10:36ff)

Which of them was neighbor?…’The one who showed mercy.’ Go and do

likewise. 

Instead of asking for a man of peace, a man who was living according to God’s way, showing what life in God’s community is like, and in order to protect their self-interests, the people not only called for Jesus death, they also chose Barabas, an insurrectionist, to be freed, reinforcing their desire to promote and protect their interests. 

Jesus’ life showed us how it is to live in the realm of God, to be within God’s community, and he did it perfectly because we aren’t able. But, his life also showed us what to expect not only from those around us but even from ourselves when we engage in thinking and living in God’s way. God, in Jesus, calls us to live God-interested (First table of the Law) and other-interested (Second table of the Law). How often have we marginalized others or gifts of God in order to justify, protect or advance our own narrow self-interest? How have we thought about or treated others who by their words or examples have exposed our concern for self and our lack of care and concern for others? Jesus’ death shows us the result of our self-interest. Thank God that our self-interest doesn’t have the last word!

Live exultantly!

 Thoughts on gratitude 

Psalm 9:1-2

I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart; I will tell of all your wonderful deeds. I will be glad and exult in you; I will sing praise to your name, O Most High.

The author of a devotion I recently read talked about the personal benefit of gratitude. The age old aphorism, God doesn’t need my gratitude. I need to give it, is the basic theme. So, I got to thinking how that might play out. Here are some of my random ruminations about that.  If God is all, and in all, and I am part of that existence of God, God’s community, God’s realm of existence, then it is not I alone that benefits, but other people and things in God’s realm benefit as well from my gratitude. 

In my experience, gratitude requires a humble heart. A humble heart approaches the rest of God’s realm differently than a proud or indifferent heart. A humble heart helps me understand that it’s not all about me. All of God’s realm can’t help but be symbiotic, to be built and to build upon one another.

When we give thanks with our whole heart, our gratitude isn’t confined to a “thank you” or even a song of praise. It is reflected in our way of thinking and in the ways we live among others. It impacts how we perceive the world around us. It comes from our core. Our gratitude is found not only in the words and thoughts expressed to God, but in the ways we think about and act towards others and the world around us (both physical and manufactured)

 “I will exult in you” An older definition of exult included the idea of jumping for joy, a rather radical notion for today. What if our gratitude included a life of active joy, jumping for joy through lives lived with concern and actions toward others and all of God’s creation? 

Live exultantly. Live joyfully!

Living Gratefully in Change (I'm still learning from my sainted mother)

 Living Gratefully in Change (I’m still learning from my sainted mother)

The devotion I read this morning was by Ellie Roscher, Gratitude at Home, Shepherd Me O God, 2022 based on Ecclesiastes 3:1-8. She drew on the ideas of change in this passage, and began her thoughts with this statement. “Part of gratitude is being at peace with what is, instead of longing for what isn’t.”  This isn’t to suggest that we shouldn’t work to make positive changes in ourselves or for others; rather, it’s about our approach to day-to-day life. It’s about being grateful to God first, not only for what we have but also for what opportunities lie before us.  She asked this question. “How can we dwell in the moment without trying to manipulate it? How can we find a home in the season we find ourselves?” 

Segway to lunch at a local restaurant after church yesterday. My wife and I had just been seated and were looking at our menus when a gentleman came up to our table. Having recently returned to my hometown after being away for almost 50 years, we have come to expect to run into people who knew either me, my sister, or someone in my family. This gentleman had been my parents pastor many years ago. We chatted, and he left us with this short story about my mother. He reminded me that my mother always wrote notes to people who were ill and always included a clipping of a cartoon from the newspaper that she thought would make them smile. On one occasion a family member of his had just had surgery and when they went through the mail, upon seeing the card from my mother, he said not to open it just yet because he knew it would make him laugh too hard. Then this retired pastor told us of visiting my mother on a cancer wing of a hospital just before her death. As he asked the nurses for directions to her room, the nurse responded, “Oh we love having Irene on the floor. She brightens everyone’s day.” I’m sure that being that ill was not what my mother had planned for her life, but her example of living gratefully in the moment and being other-interested instead of self-interested gave her a peace, and still teaches me a valuable lesson. 

Roshcer ended the devotion with this.

Gratitude is wanting what is right in front of you. It is seeing this tiny, ordinary moment

quaking with holiness. Gratitude, embodied, is to find a home within. With gratitude we

hold the key to feeling at home no matter where we are…  When we are grateful for 

what is right in front of us, the present moment becomes home. Be where your feet are.

Thank God in all things. Living gratefully not only gives you peace, but it can impact others as well.