Idols
of the Soul (and Other Lessons from Jesus)
Stephen
Terry
Commentary
for the May 28, 2016 Sabbath School Lesson
“Jesus
called them together and said, ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord
it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so
with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your
servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave—just as the Son of
Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom
for many.’” Matthew 20:25-28, NIV
In the not too distant past, whenever someone wanted an
aerial photograph of an area, a manned plane would be sent aloft with a special
camera designed for aerial photography. The process was somewhat cumbersome and
expensive so not often done. In most cases perhaps, only governmental entities
or large corporations could justify the cost. However, with the advent of drone
technology that has all changed. The tiny robot vehicles can be mounted with small,
yet high resolution, cameras capable not only of taking highly detailed
pictures but high definition video as well. This has opened up aerial
photography to the casual hobbyist. We now can easily find aerial photos and
videos online from subjects as diverse as the famous Neuschwanstein Castle to a
flyover of a mundane day at the beach. The process is even being flipped with
ground video being taken of drones doing atypical things. An example would be
individuals who decorated their drones to appear like ghosts or witches and
sending them flying through their neighborhoods to scare trick-or-treaters on
Hallowe’en, they then video the drones flying about after their terrified, diminutive
victims.
Perhaps the appeal of these drones is that they allow us
to have a fresh perspective on our world. In neighborhoods divided by privacy
fences and hedges, the drones can penetrate where human eyes normally might
not. This is obviously a concern for those who might be engaged in illegal
activities. Therefore an ongoing g battle is raging over what rights are to be
applied when law enforcement agencies are using drones for surveillance. But
hobbyists who are not looking to build court cases with what they are filming
have less formidable barriers to overcome when it comes to filming their friends
and neighbors. These activities may still be somewhat limited as drones can
still cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars. However, less expensive
drones and cameras are coming on the market every month. Far too soon, they may
be as ubiquitous as backyard dogs. Children’s birthday videos, instead of being
filmed from the ground, may be filmed from a convenient height that allows
observation above the chaos occurring at ground level. Already drones are on
the market that will follow a selected individual with non-stop video filming
of all of their activities.[i] Primarily used for sports
filming, there is no reason why the drone could not be used for any outdoor
event or gathering to document personal participation.
Maybe the appeal for a fresh perspective is
understandable in a world where the week is packaged into a series of days
where eat, sleep, work, repeat seems to be the mantra of existence. Everything
seems to derive from that mantra. The media certainly focuses on each aspect.
We are bombarded with thousands of advertisements informing us of the best
places to satiate our hunger. They also promise adequate sleep through
pharmaceuticals and pricey mattresses when life seems intent on denying it to
us. Work is often framed as the bane of our existence, the generator of the
stress that leaves us little time to enjoy a truly well-made meal or the
freedom to relax to the point where we can have that elusive sleep naturally. We
look forward to the end of the work week and release from work-related stress
only to fill our weekends with so much activity, we return to the beginning of
the work week as tired as when we left it. Sadly, even churches tend to fill
weekends with many of these activities, denying their parishioners the rest
they may so desperately need. Perhaps we feel trapped with little hope of
finding a way out. As a result, we grasp at anything that might open up new
vistas of hope for us.
The technology revolution that really took off in the
1980s with desktop computers that were less powerful than the smartphones we
carry in our pockets today, seemed to promise a new egalitarian future based on
the promises of robotics and computers. Instead, as the capabilities of our
tools increased, the levels of goal oriented stress increased as well. Whereas
in my childhood, half a century ago, the head of household could work and earn
enough income to buy a home and a car, while the other spouse, usually the wife
could have the leisure to maintain the home and raise the children under
continual parental supervision, those days have largely vanished. Now it takes
two incomes to do the same, except that too often no one is left at home to
greet the children when they arrive home from school. The large house needs to
be maintained and that costs money that the second income provides. Because two
wage earners often means two cars to commute to work, that is an added maintenance
cost as well. Then there are expensive investments in technology needed by the
children for school and by the parents so they can remain connected to the
global economy and for each family member to be connected to one another. In
the end, so much has to be earned to keep it all running that we all become
little more than wage slaves, working so that one day we will have the
opportunity to step off the labor treadmill and die. We used to be able to look
forward to some sort of surcease from all of this at retirement, but the secure
job that used to take one from school to a guaranteed retirement has also been
rapidly vanishing, replaced by short term jobs and speculative retirement investment
accounts that may or may not provide an income when one becomes too old to
continue working.
The Bible assures us that it does not have to be like
this. In fact the word “rest” occurs hundreds of times in the Bible. It has a
lot to say about God’s purpose for our lives, and from the very beginning, God
wanted us to have the rest we needed.[ii] We may often think of the
rest of the weekend as something we earn as a result of working all week, but
this distorts the picture, for God gave mankind the Sabbath, a day of rest and
blessing, before man had any opportunity to earn anything. It was the first act
of grace extended to mankind. It remains an act of grace, today. We can become
so busy and involved in chasing the illusory prize we think we should receive for
our labor that we forget the one important prize we already have, the Sabbath.
No wonder it is the only commandment in the Decalogue that says “remember.”[iii] But the Sabbath is not
just a day of rest. It is symbolic of a far greater rest. That greater rest was
offered to us through the life and ministry of Jesus. He said, “Come to me, all
you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”[iv] However, it seems we
often get so busy we do not feel we have the time to even read the words of
Jesus, let alone heed them. But He is inviting us to step off that treadmill
and find the peace and rest he is offering. His great desire is that we have
that peace.[v]
The world tells us that if we only earn enough, have
enough money, then we will find the peace that our soul craves. But the world
is lying to us, for riches will not give us that peace, they more likely will
drive any peace from us.[vi] A desire to pursue
worldly gain, instead of the peace that Christ is offering, may be the most
formidable barrier that prevents us from ever finding the peace our hearts
crave. Nonetheless, Christ will continue to knock at the door, seeking
entrance,[vii] for surprisingly, there
is a door in that barrier, but He is limited to only knocking as long as we
keep the door shut fast. He brings with Him all we need to have peace and hope
in our lives once again as we were meant to from the beginning. He invites us
to rise like drones above the chaos and stress, the chains of never-ending
labor that bind us and view things from a heavenly perspective, from His
perspective. If we do, we may discover the futility of the life we have been
living, chasing after perishable baubles, all the while growing older and feebler
until our light is finally extinguished, never having lived the life we were
given, and never having seen the many blessings strewn in our path. Those
blessings we would never have had to work so hard for as we did for the
perishable goods that drew our attention away. Maybe it is time to open that
door, let Jesus in, and find the rest and blessings that really matter.
