By Rev. Jamie Green Klopotoski
September 19, 2021
Watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APeOknk_LDk&t=1265s
I have to admit … I love video games. Especially during the pandemic, I’ve spent a lot of time in the world of video games. My favorite games are called RPGs (Role Playing Games), where you control a team of characters on their journey to save the world. They stick with you until the very end of the game. You level them up, buy them new equipment, make them stronger, and follow their stories for hours. You get to know them so well that you almost become them (thus the “role-playing” moniker). In almost every RPG I’ve played, these heroes do not and cannot die- it is an expectation for this genre of games (just like it is expected that Superman and Batman and Spiderman don’t die because they are the heroes!). But one of my favorite games, an RPG from 1997 called “Final Fantasy VII”, overturns this key expectation. One of the main characters dies in the middle of the game. She is an upbeat, joyful, young girl with a hopeful and positive outlook on life even after growing up in the slums who has a passion to save the world and to protect the environment, and after 18 hours of playing with her, getting to know her and her backstory, loving her, and caring for her… she dies.
In the video game world, this is arguably one of the most emotional moments in any game in existence. It makes grown men and stoic teenagers cry. The first time I played this game, I was absolutely shocked, and stared at the screen in disbelief. There was no way she was actually dead. She was going to come back, right? Right? She can’t be dead and gone forever?! That’s not how video games are supposed to work. But after several more hours of playing without her, I realized she was gone for good.
You may be wondering where I’m going with all this video game talk. Well, I was reminded of this shockingly unbelievable moment when the hero dies and all expectations are turned upside down, after reading this week’s passage from the Gospel of Mark. First, Jesus tells his disciples of his impending death, and they do not understand; there’s no way Jesus can die, he’s supposed to be the savior! Then after arguing about who is the greatest, Jesus tells his disciples that the last will be first, that a small, insignificant child is actually greater than them all. This scripture is just one of many, many examples of Jesus rejecting the status quo, breaking all expectations, and turning the world upside down. Jesus broke all the rules, and every time he did, it was incredibly shocking to his 1st century audience.
For generations, stories were told of a messiah who would come to save Israel, so by the time of Jesus, the Israelites had many expectations about what this savior might look like. They imagined him as a rich and powerful king, a dignified, strong, and mighty warrior, grasping a gleaming sword and riding in on a tall white warhorse with a large army of fearsome soldiers to violently defeat the Roman empire. What they got was a baby born to a poor, unmarried young girl in a stable amidst cows and sheep; a carpenter who preached peace and nonviolence and rode into Jerusalem on a donkey waving an olive branch, gathered by children and outcasts. It was the exact opposite of everyone’s expectations. And it was shocking.
Jesus did everything he wasn’t “supposed” to do: he touched the unclean, dined with sinners, and washed the feet of his disciples. Instead of touting the power of Israel’s most sophisticated weapons, Jesus preached of peaceful shepherds and beating swords into plowshares. He said crazy things like the mighty would be cast down from their thrones and the lowly would be lifted up, blessed are the poor, peace is the way, love your enemies, forgive seventy times seven times, feed the hungry, be the last in order to be the first. Ultimately, Jesus was executed by the establishment who found his subversiveness too great a threat. And that was the most shocking of all. The hero died at the end. That wasn’t supposed to happen!
From refugee in a manger to rebel on the cross, Jesus rocked the boat, challenged the status quo, and overturned expectations. So, what does that mean for us? What does it mean for our lives if we truly follow this subversive Jesus who came to turn everything upside-down? Does understanding Jesus in this way make a difference in how we live our lives? I think it does.
At least for me, one thing it does is make me question the societal pressure to “get ahead” and “climb the ladder of success.” In today’s scripture, I think Jesus is trying to tell us that life isn’t supposed to be a competition to become the most important, greatest, top dog. The goal of life isn’t to climb over others to get to the top; the goal is to serve those at the bottom. Life’s not about what you acquire, achieve, or earn, but how much you love and share. It’s not about getting up high to look down on others, dominating, intimidating, exploiting, defeating, or excluding them. It’s about seeing the image of God in each and every single animal, plant, and human being, and extending to all a radical amount of unconditional love.
What if we listened to what Jesus was trying to tell us? What if we measured our success, our greatness, not by what we took in but by what we gave away, not by the amount of influence we wield but by the service we offer, not by accumulating more but by sharing what we already have, not by being first but by working hard to see others move ahead? What kind of world would we live in? I don’t know about you, but I think it would be a pretty great world. Make no mistake, this is hard stuff, absolutely and totally different from what our culture – whether in the first century or the twenty-first – tells us. It overturns all expectations; it’s shocking to our system.
But can you imagine if, instead of trying to be the richest or the most powerful, people were regularly vying to be the most kind, the most loving, the best human they could be? If CEOs and companies were praised for how much they gave away not how much they earned? If a country’s greatness was measured by how welcoming, hospitable, and equitable it was rather than by the size of its gross domestic product? If national news programs featured those who were willing to be last so that others could go first? If reality TV shows followed those who tried to help as many people as possible? If villains in movies didn’t have to be killed in the end but could somehow be transformed with love?
On that last point, I have a story to share from a podcast I listen to called “Revisionist History” by Malcolm Gladwell. Recently he aired a three-part series about Disney’s 1989 blockbuster hit, “The Little Mermaid”. He describes how if you take a hard critical look at the movie, you quickly realize that the lessons it teaches are not at all the lessons you would actually want to pass on to children. For example, the heroine, Ariel, has to give up her voice, her identity, to be accepted. She goes from being an independent young woman full of life and adventure, intelligence and verve, to being completely dependent on a man and his kiss. At the end of the movie, what rescues Ariel from a very problematic contract, involving child slavery with the villain Ursula, is violence. Ursula isn’t arrested or tried in court or rehabilitated, she is gruesomely murdered. Scholar Laura Beth Neilson commented, “It’s too bad they couldn’t work this out a different way.” Gladwell set out to do just that, and hired screen writer Brit Marling to reimagine a new ending for “The Little Mermaid.”
Instead of a fight scene at the end of the movie, imagine this new scene: Ariel hugs Ursula. Ursula struggles to get away but Ariel keeps her arms wrapped around Ursula in a loving embrace. The force of Ariel’s feeling gains the power of actual magic, she gets her voice back, and she uses it to say to Ursula, “You hurt me, but I understand why you hurt me. I know you have suffered greatly. And even though you made me suffer greatly, too, I don’t hate you Ursula.” Ursula scoffs but her eyes go wide with feeling, no one has said a kind word to her in years. Ariel continues, “In time, understanding you better and why you’ve done the things you’ve done, I could even love you. You’ve taught me the power of my voice; I could even thank you for that.” Ursula weeps, and apologizes. Ariel accepts her apology. By the heat of Ariel’s love, Ursula is transformed from an evil octopus, an outcast living at the bottom of the sea whom everyone else is revolted, disgusted, and horrified by, into someone who could be redeemed and who, like anyone else, deserved a chance at happiness. And when Ariel’s father King Triton tries to kill Ursula, Ariel throws herself in harm’s way to protect her. Ariel then uses her voice to sing, and soon everyone joins with her. Anger begins to subside. Hearts begin to soften. All together, they create beautiful music. The proud vain old king cannot help but be moved by his daughter’s magic to unite across genders, generations, and species. Ariel tells him, “You don’t need to be the most powerful, to be the most loved.”
The new Ariel does the unexpected, she sacrifices herself for someone who is conceived of as irredeemable, she loves her enemy, she uses words and kindness instead of weapons and hate. Sound familiar? These are the same counter-cultural actions that Jesus took. Jesus turned the world upside-down by declaring a new way of life where true greatness is measured in kindness, the bad guy can be redeemed, the enemy can be loved, the outcast can be welcomed, sins can be forgiven, darkness can be transformed, love can overcome hate. This is the Kingdom of God, my friends, and we can help make it a reality, right here, right now, on earth as it is in heaven. It won’t be easy, and it may be shocking to our friends, family, loved ones… it may be shocking to ourselves. It may be uncomfortable. And we won’t always get it right. But we can start with even the smallest actions in our daily lives- put away your shopping cart, help someone cross the street, clean up after yourself, pick up trash when out for a walk, rake someone’s yard, buy less plastic, don’t forget your reusable shopping bags, make life easier for others, do work that you ordinarily would leave for someone else to do, speak up when you hear something racist or sexist or unkind, donate money, donate time. If you have any kind of power in your life, use it for good, to lift up others, to advocate for those less fortunate than you. And especially during this particular time we find ourselves living in, wear a mask, get vaccinated, be kind and patient to overworked and underpaid restaurant servers and retail store staff and hospital workers. Be bold, be brave, be shocking, turn the world upside down. Amen.
Sources:
https://www.davidlose.net/2018/09/pentecost-18-b-a-different-kind-of-greatness/
https://asermonforeverysunday.com/sermons/b43-the-seventeenth-sunday-after-pentecost-year-b/
https://shuckandjive.blogspot.com/2009/04/easter-for-non-religious-sermon.html
https://www.pushkin.fm/episode/little-mermaid-part-1-the-golden-contract/
https://www.pushkin.fm/episode/little-mermaid-part-2-the-fairytale-twist/
https://www.pushkin.fm/episode/little-mermaid-part-3-honestly-ever-after/
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