The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners .’ But wisdom is proved right by her deeds.”
Jesus
We humans seem to take great pleasure in judging each other, and calling names, especially when accismus is at work and we are madly competing for religious, social, familial or political power. It’s unfortunate because this sullies all of us, train wrecks relationships — and while piling up loads of fun, political booty and smug satisfaction for the winners — such behavior can oppress and crush the best among us. Take Jesus for instance.
Jesus was profoundly spiritually healthy, but he was a hedonist and a drunk to his contemporaries. Hmmm.
I’ve experienced something like this myself. Probably you too. You get passionate about something good, you have some success, you do things differently than done in the past and you engender all kinds of secreted jealousy and closeted competition that eventually surfaces in name calling.
It causes me to conclude something like, “Succeed, then duck!” But that is not what Jesus taught or modeled. Jesus taught that wisdom proves itself correct — and disproves the names it is called — by what it does. I love empirical, proverbial, brave and simple bits of advice like this — they salve the beaten-up and roughed-up in me.
Jesus is saying this: Keep doing the good that God puts in heart to do, and time will show if you are the real deal or not. Your actions will prove the motivations of your heart. Your behavior will speak for you. Over time, the good will show themselves to be good, the evil, evil.
Cool! Jesus is so cool! He is so wise, he is so gentle with us, he is so good.
Contestaires of all ilk take heart — time will tell.
It did with Jesus.
Thrive! 