It is an unfortunate fact that we
often judge a person’s worth by the work they do. The more important a person’s work or role in
the community, then the more worth she has.
If a person does nothing or does work that is otherwise unnecessary,
like being a minister, then we tend to regard that person as having no worth or
even worthless. We are insidious about
this. One of the first things we do when
we meet a person is judge his worth either consciously or unconsciously with
the question, “Of what use is this person to me?” Have you have ever judged a retail
employee worthless because they could not help you?...or that
cigarette-smoking, angry-looking teenager walking down the side of the road to
nowhere? I have. This is an appalling trait of ours. And, it gets worse. We’ve been known to judge a person’s worth by
standards like race, where they come from, wealth, gender, physical ability. Judging a person’s worth runs deep in our
Western mindset.
This works-based idea of worth has
also found its way into our Christian belief system with a popular
misunderstanding of what sin is. Many
say that sin has made us worthless with respect to the purpose for which God
created us. We are unable to be and do
what God created us to be and do and therefore we are worthless even in God’s
eyes. I remember a fellow student of
mine in seminary saying just that in a class discussion. Our professor stopped him and said, “Wait a
minute. We are unworthy, but we are not
worthless. There is a difference. If we had no worth in God’s eyes, then God
the Father would not have sent the Son to die for us that we might have
life. That is quite an extreme act for
something worthless don’t you think?” We
indeed are of worth to God, but none of us can say we deserve the value he
places on us.
I bring up this talk on worth because
it is one of the core motifs nestled behind this passage in Mark. It is part of a small section that began at
10:13 with Jesus blessing children and saying that whoever does not receive the
kingdom of God like a child will never enter it. Children in those days had little worth in and
of themselves. On the scale of social
hierarchy they were stationed much the same as slaves. When they came of age all that changed. Yet, Jesus calls these “worthless” children
to him and honours them above all others and blesses them – gives them worth
and dignity.
Then at 10:17 a rich young man comes
to Jesus wondering what he must do to inherit the eternal life. This man was of great worth in society. Yet, Jesus’ answer to him was basically to
give up everything and become worthless.
Jesus tells him “Give up your status and power in this world and you
will be worthy of the Kingdom of God and the inheritance of the life eternal.” This rich young man could not do that. Jesus tells his disciples, “How hard it is
for those who have wealth to enter the Kingdom of God…It is easier for a camel
to go through the eye of the needle (which was a very small gate in the wall of
Jerusalem) than for someone who is rich to enter the Kingdom of God.”
Right after that, Peter asks Jesus,
“What about us who have left behind everything to follow you?” – in other
words, “What about us who have made ourselves “worthless” for you.” Jesus assures him that they will receive a
hundred fold, but…many who are first will be last and the last will be
first. Then Jesus goes on to tell them that
there is more to the cost of worth in the Kingdom than just giving up stuff and
going on a messianic roadshow. He tells
them that in Jerusalem the powerful will treat the Son of man as if he were a
worthless criminal – mock him, spit on him, flog him, and kill him. Being in conflict with the values of this
world will entail suffering. They should
expect to suffer the same.
And finally, James’ and John’s
question, “can we sit at your right and left when you establish your rule?” (Matthew has the boy’s momma ask the
question.) James and John were blatantly
after what they considered to be the most powerful positions in Jesus’ kingdom.
For some odd reason they thought themselves
worthy of such honour. The others became
angry and indignant. Jesus tells the two
they have no idea of what they are asking.
Their thinking of the way the nations do things, where power is lorded
over people. Not so in the Kingdom of
God. In God’s way worth is found in servitude. A disciple of great worth, indeed power, in
the Kingdom of God is one who is slave to all.
According to Jesus, in the kingdom of
God we do not judge a person’s worth according to standards of power or wealth
or youth or health or success. Rather, we
determine worth according to the standards of “worthless” childlike faith; by
renouncing one’s “worth” by leaving everything behind to follow him, a
worthless visionary, on what appears to be the useless cause and learning his
worthless way of life even if it means suffering on his account; and…by being a
worthless slave to all.
This part about being a slave is very
important. You see, Jesus said he came
not to be served but to serve. Please
allow me to say something about the “worthless” nature of service in the
kingdom of God for it is defined by giving one’s life as a ransom for
others.
The word ransom to us means paying a sum of
money to a kidnapper to get them to release a person whom they have wrongfully
taken possession of. The kidnapper works with the question, “What is this
person worth to you?” That’s not exactly
what ransom would have meant to Jesus. He would have thought more in
terms of the Old Testament’s teaching that a ransom was what was paid to
restore worth to a life that had been wasted. If you remember the reading
we had from Exodus where it said that if a person’s bull or ox accidentally or
of habit gored a person and the person died the owner would have to pay a ransom,
a life price, for the redemption of the victim’s life. What seems to be
going on is that either by accident or an act of negligence life has been
wasted; the life associated with the bull and the life of the bull’s owner, and
most of all the life of the victim. Therefore, a price must be paid in
order to restore worth to the life that has been wasted albeit symbolic because
life cannot be valued according to money. Paying the life price
symbolically restored worth to a life that had been needlessly wasted.
Jesus gave his life as the life price that
restores our worth. He gave his life so
that it might pass through death and come out the other side into resurrection
and now he gives us his resurrected life in and by means of the Holy Spirit. Now, we, like him, are children of God whose
worth and dignity is restored. We all
through sin have wasted the life God entrusted to us, but Jesus has paid the
life price of his own life and restored our worth, a restoration that will come
to the fullness of its value when we join him in glory at the
resurrection.
For now, when Jesus talks about us serving each other he means that we too must
give our lives as ransoms for others. We
must devote ourselves to restoring worth and dignity to those who have
needlessly lost it. We in accordance
with the love that God has poured into our hearts with the gift of the Holy
Spirit must regard and treat each other and indeed all people in such a way as
to give worth to them. To befriend and
love another person unconditionally is to give them worth.
Restoring worth and dignity to others is our work as the “worthless”
slaves of Jesus Christ. We must
love and serve everyone in the same way that Jesus has loved and served us wanting
them to come to know that by him, in him, with him they are also worth-filled,
beloved children of God…even if they don’t act like it, even if they don’t “Go
and sin no more”, and even if it costs us dearly to be for them. We, the worthless slaves of Jesus, are not
ever to dismiss a person as worthless no matter who they are, what they are, or
what they’ve done. That’s the way broken
humanity does things. Because our life
is in Jesus because he has given us the Holy Spirit to live in us, we must not
ever judge another person worthless. That
doesn’t reflect well on our master and his ways.
What does this look like in real life? Well, the answers to that question are as
numerous as the situations of your own lives.
Don’t be afraid to love and make sacrifices for people the world judges
as worthless. Give your life a ransom
for many. Amen.
