The least of these.
Have you ever felt unwanted? Have you ever been the last one chosen for a team? Have you ever felt like you were incompetent and worthless? I can honestly say I have felt all these things in the last few weeks. It really started out from feeling unwanted to participate in an activity planned by others, but it ended with me feeling incompetent yet grateful for my incompetency. I know that sounds crazy, but it’s true.
Over spring break I had the opportunity to travel to Birmingham, Alabama with a team of students to help with tornado relief. There God turned upside down (actually right side up) my understanding of what it means to build the Kingdom of God and what it means to be a leader in the Kingdom. These students were not the “elite.” We were not the most intelligent, the most gifted, the most knowledgeable, the most equipped team in the world. Most of us had never done any kind of construction work before. ( I honestly confess that I usually do not volunteer for “service” mission trips because I feel so inadequate and useless.) However, I learned through this trip that these are EXACTLY the kind of leaders that God is looking for to build His Kingdom. Why? Because in order to succeed in our mission, we needed complete dependence on God. We couldn’t rely on our abilities or skills, but simply had to trust him.
At one point in the trip I had the opportunity to talk to an elderly lady named Martha. It was while we were tearing off and replacing a roof on a house. I was feeling pretty useless and inadequate regarding construction (primarily because I did not feel safe on the roof of the house), so I started talking to Martha. Martha shared with me how she lost her home to the tornado and was now living with her daughter and son-in-law. As she spoke through her tears, it was easy to discern that she felt unloved, unwanted, and overlooked. It broke my heart, and I encouraged her and promised her I would pray for her – I told her she was not alone, that Jesus loved her and would not leave her, and that now she has a sister in Indiana praying for her, too. I was the one in tears before we finished talking. One of the reasons I started to cry was because I realized Martha was “one of the least of these” that Jesus talks about in Matthew 25: “Whatever you have done for the least of these, you have done for me.” It was the most sanctified moment of my life – I knew it was all Jesus living in me and through me and reaching out to this lonely widow, it was not me at all. This experience gave me a greater understanding and desire to be more aware of those around me who may be one of the least of these.
After the trip I realized I needed healing from lies that I believed about God, myself, and the world, and so I did some theophostic prayer ministry on myself. God took me back to a memory I had as a child of wanting to play kickball with a group of kids from my school. It was obvious they did not want me to play with them, and they were mean to me. I realized that in this situation I believed the lies that I was unwanted and worthless and overlooked, despite my abilities and skills (yes, I was pretty good at kickball J). I asked Jesus to show me the truth about these beliefs. What he showed me rocked my world and completely changed my point of view. I had a vision of Jesus taking me to the side and saying, “I want you on my team, but you must understand that my team is not made up of the best, the elite. If this was a baseball team, my team would be made up of the slowest runners, the weakest hitters, the worst fielders. I would have the slowest runner be my lead-off man. My weakest hitter would bat clean-up. The worst fielder would be the short-stop. The one with the worst aim would be the pitcher. My team is made up of the outcasts, the misfits, the incompetent, the least of these. And it is through the least of these that I build my Kingdom. Why? Because they are God-dependent. They know they have no chance of success unless I do the work in and through them. God receives the glory, and they rejoice with me. The world’s view success is backwards...it is not the powerful, popular, and successful that I am looking for to build my Kingdom, but the least of these. They also know that the game is not really a competition – it is not about winning. It is a chance to be together, to enjoy one another, to build relationships. It is the same way in my church. It is not about winning, but about loving one another and rejoicing together. I am not looking for the best and the brightest, but the weakest and the humblest…the least of these. Come, join my team.”
This encounter with Jesus radically changed me and opened up my heart to what it means to really follow Him - to serve widows, orphans, the poor, the sick - even when you feel incompetent and useless. In God’s Kingdom, that feeling of uselessness and incompetency is really the best place to be, for it is the place where Jesus finds us and asks us to be on His team. He reveals that it is not so much about ability or doing, but about dependency on Him and being in relationship with Him.
I have thought a lot about this as a professor in the sciences. We are always on the lookout for the best and the brightest students – the ones with the “most potential.” Which ones will go to med school or have the ability to conduct research ? Which ones will build the Kingdom of God in the sciences? But I have to wonder, who would Jesus pour into if He was a science professor in the 21st century? Maybe He would choose the ones that struggle with calculus or the ones who can’t seem to get acid/base chemistry.
My perspective has definitely changed. It is not the elite, the chosen, the best who build the Kingdom, but rather those who know they are nothing without God – the ones who do not depend on themselves and their abilities and skills, but the ones who depend on God to work in and through them. It is the poor, the weak, the unskilled, the broken that Jesus chooses for His team, and through them, He changes the world - one cup of cold water at a time, one conversation at a time, one nail at a time. And we learn it’s not a competition or a race to be successful, but an opportunity to be with Jesus and to see Him perform miracles. And we rejoice together.
