More often than not, ads exist out there to make sure that I know about a product or service that I may exchange money for it. That's what they're there to do. And more often than not, I feel as though they're wasting my time, since I don't want to see that ad, but they want me to see it, and we end up slightly conflicted on that subject. They want maximum exposure, I want minimum, and I feel, more often than not, that my time is being thoroughly wasted. That's the bad news.
But with car insurance companies, they're barking up the wrong tree. Here in SK, we only have one socialist possibility for car insurance, through the government insurance company, and that's it. So any ads are not just me having my time wasted, but the companies themselves wasting their time in getting their message out there. Thoroughly humorous, and enjoyable by me.
Why am I mentioning this? Because the best ads are for services that you can't use. Next to that, the best ads are for services you don't want. The worst ads are for services that you either want or need. Those ones get into your heads and plague your thoughts, directing your activities for a while. Advertising has a way of living in your head, and convincing you of what you want and what you don't. And I'm fairly certain that you have purchased an item or service that you had zero interest in, only because it looked so neato in the ad.
But if you don't need the product, and are never going to need the product, then the ad for it becomes only so much white noise. Like the warnings on the cigarette package for people who don't smoke. Sure, they're there, but as non-smokers, you don't need those warnings at all. And this leads us to Jesus Christ, and the story of him curing the man born blind from John's Gospel.
On the surface, it's a nice story, isn't it? The disciples ask Jesus who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind, and Jesus answers that it was neither this man who sinned, nor his parents, but in order that the grace of God might be shown through him. Then Jesus restores his sight through a combination of spitting and mud making, and then the man goes and washes in the pool of Siloam, and is made clean.
Well, it's a nice story until the Pharisees get involved, which they do, and they do what they always do, which is to say that they cause trouble. They cast this guy, this formerly blind guy out, and continue their plots against Jesus. They plot against Jesus ostensibly because Jesus is healing people on the Sabbath (how dare he!), and that is a capital offense in Hebrew culture. That is, you will find yourself on the bad end of a stoning if you work on the Sabbath as a Sabbath breaker. It's happened before, and prescedent has been set.
But that's not really why the Pharisees were mad at Jesus. Not really. So he healed a guy on a Sabbath, big deal. Something tells me that if Jesus were a Pharisee, if he went to the Pharisee potlucks, and sold tickets for the Pharisee laymen's league suppers, if he made quilts and worked Pharisee bingos, and also happened to heal the sick (especially other Pharisees) on the Sabbath, they wouldn't have cared. But he didn't. Instead, Jesus made the galling and upsetting decision to tell the Pharisees that they were sinners in need of God's care and grace. And they didn't like that.
Would you?
Oh, sure, on the surface, you'd think that was fine, wouldn't you. Part of the price of admission to the Christian faith is the admission of sin, but in the Christian church, we've come up with a hierarchy of sins that are acceptable, that you're allowed to have, and ones that you're not. And if you're wrestling with sins, the sins you're allowed to get into are coveting, saying 'damn,' having a drink after supper, and so on. It reminds me of the scene from the Simpsons in which Ned Flanders confesses his sins to Rev. Lovejoy, and tells him that he has lusted after his own wife. It's like the epitome of respectable sins. And of the deadly sins, gosh, we encourage vainglory and gluttony in the church, and we don't exactly look down on avarice either. The Pharisees of the time of Jesus were awash in these respectable sins, operating in a situation in which they had vainglory and wrath to spare, but honestly didn't feel as though they needed much of anything from God at all. They were too busy forging their own destiny.
But Jesus drops some incredibly harsh words on them. He talks to them and tells them 'You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks of his own character, for he is a liar, and the father of lies. But because I tell you the truth, why do you not believe me? Whoever is of God hears the word of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God.'
This is what Jesus says to the Pharisees right before he heals the blind man. Is there any wonder they want him dead? Is there any wonder that they want this shut down? These were the most religious, the best thought of people in Israel, they had the best spots in the synagogue, they never missed an appointment with the other good synagogue people, and they were always seen tossing lots of money in the alms box. And these were the people who Jesus was castigating as being children of the devil.
You see, Jesus only really offers on thing, one service. He offers forgiveness of sins. And like with a great many other advertisements, if you feel you don't need that service, you don't really care for the ad. But if there's a continued insistence on how you do need the service, well then, you're less happy. Jesus is bashing the Pharisees over the head, time and time again, about how they need the forgiveness of sins, the grace of God, which is offered to them. And time and time again they reject it. They reject the forgiveness of sins, because they sincerely and honestly don't believe it. They believed that the blind man, the lame, the deaf, the crippled, those were the sinners, and you could tell they were sinners because they were born with such god awful defects. God wouldn't curse people who were upright, right? It was easy to tell who was born in utter sin, because they were completely and abjectly cursed.
But everyone else was by definition fine, right? The Pharisees were free to continue to be pillars of the community, and everything was all good. They had no idea of their sin, and were happy to continue in it, because they were not made like the tax collectors, born blind or deaf, or in adultery. And so the Pharisees figured that they didn't need the forgiveness of sins that Jesus offered. And if they didn't need the forgiveness of sins that Jesus offered, well then, they didn't need Jesus at all. The Pharisees were horrified that Jesus dared to state that they needed the same forgiveness of sins as the blind, the adulterers, the tax collectors, and so on.
And you and I? Comfy middle class Christians? Where do we factor in? It's an interesting question. Jesus says that he came in order that the blind may see, and those who see may become blind. He came to give law and gospel, that the hills may be made low, and the valleys be raised up. He came for the great leveling, to oppose the proud and give grace to the humble. What Jesus does is to not make people blind, but to expose their blindness. He doesn't make people lame, but he shows their lameness. He doesn't make them into sinners, but he exposes their sins. When he did that to the Pharisees, they picked up stones to stone him.
If you go to someone comfy in their life, someone who is smug, someone who is happy with everything that is going on, and tell them that Jesus died for their sins, then they will have no need for him, and if you point out that need for him, they will resist you, pick up rocks, and try to stone you. But if you find someone broken by their sin, someone who is bent almost double beneath the weight of the sin they carry around, then they will cling to the cross of Christ. That's the work of law and Gospel, that's the work of opposing the proud and giving grace to the humble, that's the work of the word of God, to break us down, and build us up.
How does that happen? Through the grace of God. Through the work that he does to remove sins. And how do we encounter that over the course of an average day? Well, there is some good advice out there that if someone offers you a mint, or some gum, you take it. They're not just trying to be polite. They're sending you a signal. Your breath stinks so badly, you'd think you were drinking liquefied onions. And they're letting you know subtly that you need your breath to be freshened. The
reason that this is complicated is that you can't smell your own breath. You always think your own breath is just fine, because you can't smell it of your own. But other people can. They can tell it stinks, they can tell you need a mint to take away that stench, so they offer you one. Take it. Don't be offended, don't get mad, don't claim you don't need it, take the mint, and be cleansed from the inside out. It's the same with the SacraMints. Holy Communion, baptism, they're offered for the forgiveness of sins. When it comes time for Sunday, for you to think about the small white circle that you are given, it is for the forgiveness of sins. And Jesus pointing that out to you is the same as someone offering you some gum or a mint. If you don't think you need it, you're wrong. You can't always tell your own sin, but Jesus certainly can. Come to the altar of God, hear his words 'take and eat. Take and drink. My body and by blood given for the forgiveness of your sins.'
Don't get mad, don't get offended, don't think that you don't need this mint, just take it, be forgiven, and be healed.
PJ.
No comments:
Post a Comment