Imagine four persons in a room: The first is a
powerful dictator who rules a country. His word commands armies and his
shifting moods intimidate subordinates. He wields a brutal power. Next to him
sits a gifted athlete at the peak of his physical prowess, a man whose
quickness and strength have few equals. His skills are a graceful power for
which he is much admired and envied. The third person is a rock star whose
music and charisma can electrify an audience and fill a room with a soulful
energy. Her face is on billboards and she is a household name. That's still
another kind of power. Finally, we have a newborn, a baby, lying in its crib,
seemingly without any power or strength whatsoever, unable to even ask for what
it needs. Which of these is ultimately the most powerful?
The irony is that the baby ultimately wields the
greatest power. The athlete could crush it, the dictator could kill it, and the
rock star could out-glow it in sheer dynamism, but the baby has a different
kind of power. It can touch hearts in a way that a dictator, an athlete, or a
rock star cannot. Its innocent, wordless presence, without physical strength,
can transform a room and a heart in a way that guns, muscle, and charisma
cannot. We watch our language and actions around a baby, less so around
athletes and rock stars. The powerlessness of a baby touches us at a deeper
moral place.
This is the way we find and experience God's
power here on earth, sometimes to our great frustration, and this is the way
that Jesus was deemed powerful during his lifetime. The Gospels make this
clear, from beginning to end. Jesus was born as a baby, powerless, and he died
hanging helplessly on a cross with bystanders mocking his powerlessness. Yet
both his birth and his death reveal the kind of power upon which we can
ultimately build our lives.
This is not an easy concept to grasp since our
idea of power is normally rooted in the notion that power lies in the ability
to overwhelm, not underwhelm, others. And yet we understand this, at least
somewhat, in our experience of babies, who can overpower us precisely by their
powerlessness. Around a baby, every mother and father and grandparent has
learned, we not only watch our language and try not to have bitter arguments;
we also try to be better, more loving persons. Metaphorically, a baby has the
power to do an exorcism. It can cast out the demons of self-absorption and
selfishness in us. That's why Jesus could cast out certain demons that others
could not.
Blessed are you who have suffered the violence of
others in this world. Women who have been abused, workers robbed of their
integrity in the workplace, children who have been abandoned. All who felt he
power of rejection and misunderstanding to someone’s advantage. How should we
respond to those moments?
That is what I am going to do, says Jesus. I am
going to say “I love you,” to my Father. I will do it by undergoing insults and
humiliating death because I love God above these things. And I love the world,
everything that is in it. And I love you, with the fullness and warmth and
generosity of God’s everlasting love.
God is walking with us this
morning when we pray: “When
pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.” (Proverbs
11:2).
Lord,
I pray for all my Sonshine Friends who are “bowed down” feeling shame or
disgrace. Let us find the grace of humility to raise us up beyond our worst
fears and live in God’s everlasting love.
