Ransom for Our Imprisonment
Wednesday of the Second Week of Lent
Matthew 20:17-28
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/030426.cfm
At the beginning of this gospel, Jesus explains the passion where he will be tortured, die, and resurrected. Then a mother of two of his disciples approached him and demanded that her sons be at his right and left side in the kingdom. Jesus explains that she doesn’t know what she is asking. To follow Jesus is not all about the glory, but it involves accepting a fate of struggle like Jesus just described. The brothers accept this fate, and Jesus lets them know that they will indeed struggle; but the place in heaven is not for him to give but the Father’s.
On hearing this, the other disciples became annoyed by the two brothers. They and their mother were making it about merit and ranking. Their following of Jesus in this sense was some form of a competition where some are more deserving of a higher position. They were seeking power structures like humanity has created in the world; the structures that make one person greater than another. Structures where some people achieve wealth, accolades, and awards while others go hungry, are ostracized, and are looked down upon. We create systems of rankings where there are winners and losers and a pecking order of the best to the worst. These systems give us a sense of grounding even if we are on the lower end of it. It gives a sense of justification and reasons for what happens to us. We are able to logically judge and score others within our systems of power and prestige that give us a sense of fairness and unfairness. Jesus played with these themes in his parables like the prodigal son.
These systems are what Jesus was constantly standing up against as they imprison us. They’re a distorted way of looking at God’s creation. They will always leave us wanting more. They put us in a position of competition with one another. They give us a sense of earning where we are ultimately responsible for our success or our demise. One day we are in, and the next day we are out. This method of thinking is anti-grace.
Jesus is calling us to another way. One where the servant is great, and those that strive for greatness will be the least amongst us. For Jesus came not to be served, but to serve. And, we are called to do the same. This is what Jesus died for and how Jesus was a ransom for many. It wasn’t about counting out each of our sins and dying for them. God’s grace and mercy needs no sacrifice, we do. Jesus was a ransom not to God, but a ransom to release from our imprisonment. Our need and desire for these power dynamics that give us a sense of security in the midst of the anxiety they drive. Jesus’ ransom was showing us that those dynamics kill the God amongst us.
God’s grace and mercy go against our fabricated reality. God created us in God’s image with the grace for us to share with one another, and we decided to imprison ourselves in a system where we fight for grace and keep it to ourselves. Jesus was the fullness of God’s grace amongst us, and we couldn’t accept it and killed him. Jesus was a ransom freeing us from an imprisonment we created and continue to propagate and support.
May we move past the comforts of judgment, certainty, and veneration into recognizing that we are all created in the image of God making us all loved equally just as we are; no one is better and no one is worse.
