let's start by at least telling the truth

When I asked the CEO how he came to own so much wealth, he told me, “Unlike some overpaid exec who gets a nice salary just for showing up, I had the idea and took the risk that made the wealth possible.” When I asked the overpaid exec, she told me, “Unlike some yes-man in middle management, I secure the wealth through my big picture vision and forecasting.” When I asked the yes-man in middle management, he told me, “Unlike the whiny foreman, I earn my living through cheerful dedication to the company.” When I asked the whiny foreman, he told me, “I’m not some lazy union worker; I don’t expect something for nothing.” When I asked the lazy union worker, she told me, “Unlike the woman on food stamps, I have a job.” When I asked the woman on food stamps, she told me, “Unlike the good-for-nothing beggar, I go legitimately through the system and only take what I need to support my family.” When I asked the good-for-nothing beggar, he told me this:

“I own nothing. Everything I have is but a gift that God has entrusted me to use for the sake of the world. Give up everything that you own, come follow me, and you will experience my wealth.”

If this reads like a cutesy little allegory with an intriguing, if ultimately impractical, punch line, and not like a somewhat obvious paraphrase of our core story, then it’s likely that we haven’t fully admitted how strange our story is.

Interesting factoid: did you know that your average middle-class American household owns more individual items, more material stuff, than did King Henry VIII?

So yes, I confess that I don’t know what to do with the Jesus story, really. I’d be lying if I said I can easily take a look at my position with a comfortable income, within the comfortable middle class of the most materially privileged society in human history, and honestly fit it somewhere in the narrative of the vagrant who advised that we take the “lowest place” at the banquet (Lk. 14:10), who told the priggish young man to sell everything (Mark 10:21), who told the parable of the rich man who had already received good things in his lifetime (Lk. 16:25).

No wonder charismatics tweak the story: Jesus became lowly in order to lift us up—it was a temporary stunt, you see, necessary only to get us the glory we deserve, but, fear not, it didn’t fundamentally change what sorts of things we ought to find glorious. No wonder preachers of the prosperity Gospel and “Christian values” just ignore Jesus entirely. No wonder the Catholics developed such a confusing labyrinth of philosophical arguments to show why the Almighty Christ enjoys a home in rich basilicas and cathedrals unlike Jesus who had “nowhere to lay his head” (Mt. 8:20). No wonder Lutherans prefer talking about Paul and his invisible forgiveness of sins to Jesus and his all too visible lifestyle.

Like I said, I also don’t know what to do with this story. I know how to build and promote organizations that try to “help” people living in Jesus’ circumstances. But I’ve never aspired to be in Jesus’ circumstances. I honestly don’t get what good would come from that. Look at me. Look at where I live. I’m just as hypocritical as anyone else.

That said, if I do have one strength as a preacher and teacher, it’s this: honesty. I may not know what to do with the story, but I at least refuse to lie about what the story is. Maybe in James and John’s shoes I might also have moments where I’m tempted to forget it and try to latch onto the son of God like he’s a show-pony, who can win me some glory-by-association (Mark 10:35-45). But in my better moments, I’ll collect myself and return to confessing that impulse as sin, not preaching it as Gospel. I won’t distort a theology of resurrection to show how it negates the Nazarene’s theology of mundane, day-to-day cross-carrying. I won’t start prattling nervously about how “times have changed, you see,” and “Capitalism, you see,” and “wealth generates wealth, you see,” as if Jesus’ lack of economic education is where he got off track.

And maybe that’s a good place for the faithful to start, if we’re serious about leading from the bottom in this society. Maybe we start by telling the truth:

“Please go to work on us, O God,

We don’t know where to start.

We live at a level of comfort unknown to even the rich people in Jesus’ day.

We own more stuff than King Henry VIII, for crying out loud.

We, all of us at some level, believe that there is some truth to ‘trickle-down’ economics.

We are convinced that, while billions are still left out, billions of others are better off than they

    would’ve been without an economic system that runs on personal acquisitiveness and envy.

So when you say, ‘Take up your cross’, we don’t really know what that means.

Or even worse, we know exactly what that means; we just don’t agree that that’s the way to go.

It just doesn’t seem that productive.

So we don’t do it.

Have mercy on us.

We, probably not so humbly, ask that you go to work on us anyway.

If we’ve proven ourselves incapable of going 0 to 60mph in our faithfulness, please help us to at

least get from 0 to 3 or 5.

And maybe next year, we can get to 6.

Who knows? Maybe we’re not the disciples you’d’ve hoped for, but we’re the ones you got.

So go to work on us, O God.”

Surely changing the world involves telling the truth about it. So let’s start by being truth-tellers this Lent and see what God can do with that.