How many of us have ever had a friend who just had to have their own way? Not merely in most things, but everything? I’ve known people like that. In truth, there is a time in our lives when just about all of us are like that. It’s a phase of human development, something we leave in middle childhood. We go through our early lives as if our thoughts are the world’s thoughts. You’ll see it most often when some six-year-old says of a puppy, “He wants me to hold him.” As if he really knew what the puppy wanted — actually he has no capacity for processing the idea that a puppy might want anything he didn’t want for it. Children only have room for recognizing their own feelings.
Eventually, they confront reality when playing with other kids. These other kids don’t always go along with everything. At first might complain, “They aren’t very nice.” If they continue through life focused only on their own inner voice, they will never be nice themselves. They simply will not develop the capacity to imagine what it’s like to — as the song says — “walk a mile in my shoes.” The capacity to see both sides of a debate at the same time, to make allowances for others to see things differently without the reflex to label it “evil,” these are marks of adulthood.
It doesn’t require the sort of self denial where one has no internally generated opinions, a sponge which absorbs everything and always does what they are told. Rather, it requires merely a willingness to step outside oneself for brief periods. We must learn we, too, can be a real problem for others, and to sense somewhat the pain we cause others. It’s called “having a conscience.” We decide the other beings around us deserve some consideration, and we try to offer some measure of accommodation, even to our loss at times.
Those of us who get it, whose conscience works reasonably well, find we really don’t lose all that much. There’s a big payoff in finding a majority of those around us are more likely to give in to us when it’s our turn, when there is something we really need, not just vaguely desire. Once we’ve learned this social skill, we have also pretty much learned when we must be inflexible. There are some things on which we simply cannot compromise. It’s asking too much. In this, too, we are actually doing something beneficial for others — we are firm in something connected to universal consequences, the big picture, maybe even Eternity.
And the Lord said, “To what shall I liken the men of this generation, and what are they like? They are like children sitting in the marketplace and calling to one another, saying:
‘We played the flute for you,
And you did not dance.
We mourned to you,
And you did not weep.'” (Luke 7:31-32)
Jesus’ illustration was about the scribes and Pharisees. They were the ones who had clustered around John the Baptist, too, but in the end rejected his message. Luke tells us the sinners who took the opportunity to repent under John’s ministry were a glory to God. Those of the Jewish leadership who had rejected John’s message were rejecting God, in reality.
Everything had to be the Pharisees’ way. If anything confronted them which didn’t fit into their nice, neat categories, it must be wrong. They had God figured out, and no one was permitted to question those assigned boundaries. That was the same as questioning God, in their eyes. What it really meant was God was not allowed to work outside their boundaries. “Now, now, Lord, get back in Your box.”
They were like children who never quite grew up. If someone saw God in a way they didn’t, then he simply could not be seeing God. They had no capacity to see God from any different perspective than their own. They reminded Jesus of those brats in the marketplace (the playground of ancient times) who insisted everyone else play whatever game they wanted to play. If they felt like playing wedding, the other kids had better be ready to dance. If they felt like playing funeral, the other kids had better have tears in their eyes.
John the Baptist came along, virtually reciting the Old Testament, but was rejected because he didn’t wear the first-century version of a suit and tie. Instead, John followed a strict regimen of self-denial, avoiding anything which might be mistaken for luxury. Oddly, his recommendations for repentance were fairly moderate, not demanding folks take up his personal habits. But because he was so ascetic, the Pharisees said he had a demon, he was a madman.
By comparison, Jesus lived a fairly easy life. He went to weddings, He slept in houses, accepted the generous gifts offered by rich folks, and hung out with the laid-back types who knew they couldn’t impress anybody. He quoted more of the Old Testament than John the Baptist did, and was quite popular in how He taught. He was everybody’s friend. The Pharisees called Him a drunk and a glutton, said He hung out with sinners.
Yet it was clear to anyone outside the elite hierarchy how both of these men were serving God. John had called Jesus the Lamb of God, and Jesus had said John was the greatest prophet who ever lived. Both very obviously cared deeply about people, and made a genuine effort to lead them closer to God. They were opposites in many ways, yet on the same side. The contrast pointed to a holiness which the Pharisees could never grasp, much less match.
