Thayer Thursday – The Double-Stuffed Oreo Gospel
My son loves Double Stuffed Oreo Cookies. If he finishes all his dinner, he gets to have one for desert. This is usually an effective incentive for him to eat the healthy foods we give him. Sometimes it doesn’t work – but for the most part, when we tell him he gets to have a Double Stuffed Oreo Cookie if he eats all of his dinner; it’s not long before he cleans his plate, throws both of his fists into the air in a moment of triumph, looks over at me with a grin (and a bit of the last bite of his dinner remaining in his mouth) and says: “Double Stuff Oreo Cookie?” He loves eating them, and I love giving them to him. It’s a great pleasure of mine as a parent to bring this wonderfully childish joy to my son.
This is how we tend to look at our relationship with God. After all, it seems to be how the world works: work hard, be good, help people and you’ll get rewarded for it. For the first century Jew, this was the prevalent worldview. They largely believed that anybody who was following Yahweh and doing what they were supposed to do would receive material rewards or physical blessings. This is why, for instance, in John 9:2 Jesus’ disciples ask who sinned causing a man to be born blind. This is also why in Matthew 19:16-30 the disciples were astonished that anybody could be saved since it was so hard for somebody who is rich to be saved. They believed that material blessings were indicative of God’s favor and pleasure with how you were acting. Jesus, however, digging deep into the heart, shatters this belief.
Matthew places the story of the Rich Young Man right in the middle of his recounting of Jesus’ teaching about what it means to be great in the Kingdom of Heaven. At the heart of this story Jesus says to the Rich Young Man: “I don’t just want your obedience to a list of rules – I want you. I want all of you. Your money and your possessions are a hindrance to that. They own you, you don’t own them – and I won’t share you with any idol no matter how much you think it’s a blessing from me.” Jesus asks the Rich Young Man to abandon his wealth and his flawed understanding of how God works; and in the process exposes the Rich Young Man’s real lord: his money. He assumed that money meant he was blessed by God; Jesus turns it upside down and tells him to die to himself in order to gain treasures in heaven. He teaches him that in order to become great, he must become little. As my Pastor Talbot Davis once said, “[Jesus] said nothing about the size of your bank account and everything about the size of your surrender.”
Right now, my son cares about his Double Stuffed Oreo cookie. He knows that if he eats what’s on his plate, he’ll get what he wants. But as his father – as much as I enjoy giving him his cookie, I care far more about his health. I care far more about him getting the proper nutrition he needs to stay healthy than I do about his momentary pleasure from a cookie. Jesus teaches the Rich Young Man that he cares far more about his submission to Him and his love for others than He does about his wealth and possessions. He exposes his idolatry to offer Him eternal riches – teaching him that in order to become great, he must become little. C.S. Lewis portrays this wonderfully in his book The Weight of Glory:
Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.
Don’t be pleased with the Oreo Cookie. Surrender to God whatever it is you think makes you great and become little. Give it all up to follow Jesus. It’s not easy, but it’s worth it.
Chris Thayer
Categories: Blog, New Testament, Thayer Thursday
Great post, Chris! There is nothing in this world that is better than Jesus and the sooner we realize that the better off we will live.
by Matthew Gaither on Oct 31, 2013 at 11:45 pm