Opening the Eyes of the Blind

The third and final examination of Jesus teachings in Luke 15 & 16

This is the third in a series of three essays on Jesus’ teachings on belonging in Luke 15 & 16. Read part one and part two for the full context.

Perhaps one of the saddest and most painful aspects of having a social deficit is the failure to recognize the normal signs of friendliness and affection when they are extended towards you. Those who operate within a baseline sense of belonging, provided by the warm glow of a psychic cloud, do not exist in a hive mind. Each person within the flock of 100 has smaller circles for whom they hold greater and lesser degrees of affection, and others with whom they dislike.

Yet precisely because they operate from a shared baseline, members of different social groups can sort themselves out through subtle signals of warmth and disdain. The autistic individual is not immediately cast out of this group; he is often receiving many of those signals all the time; but the inability to recognize and interpret them means that he may be feeling a lack of belonging even when there are people who feel affection towards him.

Depending on how overt or subtle cultural signs of positive and negative regard are, and what sensitivities and deficits the individual struggles with can lead to drastically different outcomes. In a polite culture with strong rules of etiquette, someone who is hypersensitive to positive signs of affection and hyposensitive to signs of rejection might feel loved and appreciated all the time, completely unaware of when people are annoyed or behaving disingenuously.

Consider the fictional example of Sheldon Cooper, from The Big Bang Theory. Sheldon thinks so highly of himself, that criticisms and complaints run off his back. Yet being a good and caring friend is also an important part of his self identity, and while this care usually comes in the form of brutal honesty about the deficiencies of others, it is also portrayed through his consistent practice of always offering hot beverages to those in need of comfort. His friends tolerate the ruder aspects of his behavior, and over time, help him recognize where he oversteps the lines.

Others may have a low awareness towards subtle signs of affection, and a deep sensitivity to rejection. Hyper-awareness of inconsistencies in the behavior of others leads to cynicism, and repeated rejection erodes trust. This is a painful combination that can easily push people towards isolation and despair.

What can be done? First, it is important to recognize the existence of such individuals, the reality of their deficits, and their inability to change certain aspects of those tendencies. This is a fact that Jesus seems to be pointing out explicitly through these three parables. Although He is not diagnosing or describing what we would call autism explicitly, he is demonstrating the fact that there are people who have a limited ability to connect with others through the normal and natural means.

But recognition of this fact does not mean that all needs should be accommodated. Such deficiencies can easily be used as an excuse that keeps these people from growing. People with social deficits can grow. No one arrives fully formed. Problematic behavior often develops as a coping mechanism, which may need to be unlearned by the individual. But those who have never lacked the benefit of friendship and belonging should realize that there is something innate that needs to be accommodated for. Patience and care go a long way.

Social groups ought to consider what is keeping certain people away. If the individual who comes to visit your church or your small group leaves, it would be wise to reflect on why. In our current culture, when someone seems standoffish, people assume they want to be left alone. This assumption is the blindness of the flock. In reality, they may not know how to connect. Making an effort to seek out and speak to those who sit in the back or stand at the margins is very important.

As a youth, I can recall many occasions when I came to a new social environment, and struggled to fit in. I can recall many times when I would see a group of a hundred or so quickly form into circles of four to ten people, and suddenly find myself alone. My fears of rejection and embarrassment caused me to adopt an aloof demeanor. Sitting in the back was a safe way to keep from making faux pas. But if I wanted to find belonging, I would need to insert myself into a group. I could do this, but it took great effort, and the results were not always good. The pain of negative experiences almost always outweighed the joy of success. This made it more difficult each time.

In my rather unremarkable career in youth ministry, I recognized this pattern, and would always seek out the lone kid in the back. They would often maintain the facade of contentment for a while. But no one wants to be alone in the flock. It takes more than a simple greeting to make them feel welcome. I needed to show interest in them, probe them with questions to find out about them. This became easier as an adult reaching out towards kids. My attention was “high status” in some sense. But it has limitations.

Clearly the father loved the son whom he allowed to go away. He could provide love and affection in the vertical domain indefinitely. But he could not provide the horizontal belonging of peers.

This is why one of teaching people to reach out to those among us should be one of the primary lessons taught to our youth.

The fact that it is not so readily taught means that the same dynamics persist as an adult. My own peers are perfectly content to let me sit in silence among them, perhaps assuming that I am getting the same warmth and glow from the cloud of social belonging that they feel. But I am not. In an age of such unprecedented autonomy and choice, those who want to be alone stay home. The willingness of someone to come and sit in a church or a small group, even if they don’t exhibit signs of warmth and enthusiasm should be recognized for what it is; a deficient attempt to fulfill the need for connection.

The fact that Jesus knew and understood this becomes clear when the three parables of Luke 15 are connected to the next parable he delivers to the same group. I have never heard it connected in a sermon, yet it is part of the same message Jesus shares at the same time, and with the same group. He directs his attention towards his own disciples, teaching them about how they ought to lead, but it is spoken in the presence of the pharisees and scribes that are questioning him:

He also said to the disciples, “There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was wasting his possessions. And he called him and said to him, ‘What is this that I hear about you? Turn in the account of your management, for you can no longer be manager.’ And the manager said to himself, ‘What shall I do, since my master is taking the management away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do, so that when I am removed from management, people may receive me into their houses.’ So, summoning his master’s debtors one by one, he said to the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ He said, ‘A hundred measures of oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and sit down quickly and write fifty.’ Then he said to another, ‘And how much do you owe?’ He said, ‘A hundred measures of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and write eighty.’ The master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings.” Luke 16:1-9

This parable is quite problematic to the common conception of Jesus as an egalitarian social justice warrior. It seems like he is praising the kind of behavior he explicitly condemns in many other places. But when we examine it in the context of the previous parables, many things are unlocked.

This manager is the temperamental and intellectual opposite of the prodigal son, but his key crime is the same: he is wasting possessions. Yet he is a shrewd manager of money. He knows how to work the system. Just like the prodigal, who gains no source of income, his access to unearned wealth is limited. Also unlike the prodigal, he knows his limitations; the life of a laborer is not on the table, nor will he become a beggar, who, in the gospels, are routinely dismissed by the moral people who assume they came to that position as a result of their own sinfulness.

What is left off the table is the role of tax collector, which would be the smart move for a man with this skill set. Jesus deals with them in other places. So what does the man do? He uses his position to secure friends.

Jesus is telling his disciples that friendship is an extremely valuable commodity. More valuable than material wealth. Those who lack it know this, but those who come by it easily often fail to recognize its worth.

What is Jesus saying in the wider context of the lesson? I think it is something like this. The Pharisees and scribes are coming to him as a (symbolic) group of ten, the demographic minority, “moral majority” position within the group of 100. They are launching a criticism against another (symbolic) group of ten, the tax collectors and sinners, another minority group within the body of 100. Unlikely bedfellows, but united by being on the ‘outs’ with the majority.

He is essentially saying “You have been stingy towards your fellow man, so don’t fault them for finding the thing that you should value most (belonging), that you take for granted.” But there is another layer on top of this. Why did the scribes and Pharisees loath the tax collectors? Commentators will tell you that it is because they were viewed as traitors, colluding with the Romans against the interests of their own people. That is certainly how they were taught to be viewed by the jewish authorities. Why would someone be willing to betray their own people? The stated motivation is wealth.

But what does the parable of the shrewd manager tell us about human nature? Belonging is worth more than wealth. Consider the second parable. Ten coins, one missing. When it is found, a celebration occurs. What would a celebration for a group of about 10 consist of? Perhaps a meal of a young goat? What does it cost to celebrate? In those times, the cost of a young goat was somewhere between 4-12 Denarii. To celebrate finding one coin, all ten would be spent. Belonging is worth more than wealth.

The sheep are blind to the wilderness. They don’t want what they already have, which is belonging. People want what they don’t have. What the Pharisees wanted was money, or the things that it acts as a proxy for, power and respect. They certainly didn’t want money to gain more friends. So Jesus speaks to them about money. But is he really speaking about money?

“One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful in that which is another’s, who will give you that which is your own? No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” Luke 16:10-13

What is the unrighteous wealth that the Pharisees have been unfaithful with? Not material wealth. Social acceptance. Status. Belonging. This is the context in which we can understand the conclusion of Luke’s account:

The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all these things, and they ridiculed him. And he said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts. For what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God.

“The Law and the Prophets were until John; since then the good news of the kingdom of God is preached, and everyone forces his way into it. But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the Law to become void. - Luke 16:14-17

What is exalted among men? It wasn’t money. It was a badge of respect. It is the position of belonging to a group of 10, that looks down at others. Not just at the one lost sheep who can’t get their act together, but the other 90. The self-righteous levy a social tax on those around them in far greater excess than the Romans.

Jesus does not defend the violation of the law. But he recognizes that the tax collectors and the sinners, united in their failure, and reluctant to abandon the friends they have found in exchange for the approval of the Pharisees, are far more honest about what really matters to them, and they have chosen to cling to something of far greater value. They have uncovered the secret of the Kingdom, in which the status of sonship is incorruptible and irrevocable.

The church has long recognized this fact in its welcome of sinners who appear before us like the prodigal son. But too often, it has recognized the signs of a sinful past as something that can be forgiven, while failing to recognize the underlying cause. Cliques of former sinners with radical conversion stories coincide next to cliques of judgemental Pharisees. The people falling through gears of the machine don’t like the same today as they once did. Many of them mask their pain in isolation.

I am exploring the reasons for this in another essay, reflecting on the intergenerational relationship expressed through God’s identification as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God does not relate to fathers and their sons and grandsons in the same way. This means that what worked for our parent’s generation often won’t work for us, nor can we expect what works for us to work for our own children.

But the pattern for building this kingdom is laid out here in the ministries of John and Jesus. Both were individuals, who could not accept a form of belonging that required conforming to the patterns of the wilderness. Yet they extended the invitation to belong to other individuals; tax collectors, sinners, and a few sets of brothers, as different from each other as they were separated from the broader community.

More importantly, Jesus went above and beyond the socially expected means of conveying interest and affection towards His followers. He did not wait for them to approach him, or even issue an open invitation, but sought them out, and called them specifically. Not only with his disciples, but with other lost sheep, like the tax collector Zacchaeus. He did this while ignoring the presence of people who considered themselves to be important.

He built this into a group of 10 plus 2, and they belonged to a greater group of about 70. This was the pattern which was replicated throughout the Roman empire, and eventually changed the status quo. But once it became the status quo, new individuals kept cropping up. And they will continue to do so until Christ returns. The task for us is to identify them, welcome them in, and listen to them, letting them inform us about the wilderness we cannot see.