Growing up I always loved numbers. That’s the 0, 1, 2, 3 variety – not the book of the bible – which as a kid can be tough to get through in spots. Numbers lead to counting, and counting goes from one thing initially to multiples things soon after. And before you know it things become groups and groups get compared to all sorts of other things and off you go.

We’re taught to make comparisons at an early age. It’s been fun to watch my two children, ages 10 and 6, learn the same lessons I did as a child.

Sally has four apples. Bobby have five. Who has more?

Which leads to other comparisons down the road.

The US produces 19 trillion dollars of gross domestic product, or GDP, a year. Japan’s GDP is 5 trillion. Who has more wealth?

Early on it’s simple. Bobby has more apples. The US has more wealth.

Sally has six oranges. Bobby has four. Who has more?

Japan has an average life expectancy of 85 years. The US life expectancy is 79 years. Which people live longer?

When you combine comparisons, well, that’s when things get really interesting.

Bobby has more apples, and Sally has more oranges. Who has more fruit? Sally wins that one, 10 to 9.

The US has a higher GDP, tho Japan’s life expectancy is higher than ours. Which people have a higher quality of life? Good luck deciding that one ?

Simple Math
Today’s text from Matthew 21 draws on similar comparisons.

The religious leaders of the day loved their groups. Loved to create them. Loved to judge by them. Loved the social hierarchy implied by them.

The math they used was simple enough. Follow the laws of God and you’re good.

Honor your father and mother.
Keep the sabbath holy.
Don’t lie. Or cheat. Or steal.

Bobby follows religious laws. Sally doesn’t. We know because people have been keeping score, tallying up points as they go. Which is doing the will of God?

All this left a fairly clear who’s who grouping.

With the pious, the religious, the self-righteous on one side. And everyone else on the other. In the eyes of the religious leaders, this distinction was crystal clear.

Calculations were complete. Groups were made. That was that.

Next Level
When Jesus enters the scene things get, well, more complex. He too makes a basic comparison.

The comparison was so straight forward it may just have been a rhetorical question. Jesus starts by saying four little words: what do you think?

With it he invites response. With perhaps an obvious answer to come.

A man had two sons, Christ begins. He went to the first and asked him to work in the vineyard that day. The son initially said no. But later changed his mind, and went. The man then went to the second son with the same question. Sure thing, the son replied. But he did not go.

Which of the two did the will of the father? What do you think?

Said a certain way it almost sounds sarcastic.

What do you think?

Duh. Come on. Obviously.

The religious leaders he queried must have felt the same.

They didn’t huddle up.
Or split hairs.
Or respond they didn’t know.

Instead, they replied, without hesitation. “The first.” The son that said he wouldn’t go, but later did. They had answered correctly.

But there was more to Jesus’ simple question. It went beyond a duh, come on, or obviously. And those pious religious leaders had completely missed it.

For they were operating with just one variable.
What people do with all those laws.
And only two groups.

Bobby follows the law. Sally doesn’t.

In their eyes one was clearly righteous, the other clearly not.

Calculations were clean. Complete. Done clap.

Jesus’ parable went beyond that.
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With it he’d expanded their universe by adding one variable more.

What you say you’ll do. And what you actually do.

To geek out, just a bit, we could even put it on a two by two grid. With what you say you’ll do on one axis, and what you actually do on the other.

Grid
The four groups end up …
1) You say you’ll follow, and you do
2) You say you’ll follow, and you don’t
3) You say you won’t follow, and you do
4) You say you won’t follow, and you don’t

If your yes is always yes, group one.
And if your no is always no, group four it is.

Christ’s parable is about the other two groups.

Those that –
Say they won’t follow and do.
Say they will follow and don’t.

These categories have nuance. They infer change. Transformation. A difference between intent, and action. And movement, in this silly little grid, from one category to the next.

The religious leaders had all the right words, felt they had all the right actions. Clearly they felt they said they’d follow, and did.

And everyone else?

According to those that challenged Jesus that day –
They don’t have the right words.
They don’t have the right actions.

People like –
• Lepers, physically unclean, cast out of the city.
• Tax collectors, like Zacchaeus, that wee little man, that wee little man was he…who took more money from people than he should.
• Prostitutes, whose profession left them outside traditional societal norms.

And based on that, according to the pious things didn’t look that different.

Transformation
Yet Jesus healed lepers. Making them clean. Enabling them to rejoin their communities, once again. And they believed.

When Zacchaeus, a noted crook, gives half his possessions to the poor, and repaid those he defrauded, four-fold, Jesus announces salvation to his house.

When John the Baptist encountered prostitutes he baptized them, offering forgiveness of sins. And they too believed.

Of the four women mentioned in Matthew’s presentation of Jesus’ genealogy, two – Tamar and Rahab – are noted prostitutes in the Hebrew bible. The path to Christ, and of Christ, is sometimes messier than we first might assume.

And the pious religious leaders who said they followed the father? And thought they had been? Jesus had some surprising news. Some had not changed their minds. Some had not believed.

Their standing, and the standing of so many they’d judged, was not what it seemed.

Once again Jesus had turned the tables on the cultural elite.

The last had become first.
The lowly made high.
With salvation now offered not for some, but all.

The expansion of who could access God’s kingdom, through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, had begun.

Close
Numbers. They run our world, don’t they? From what’s in our bank account, to how long we live. They serve as the metric by which we compare so very much.
Yet when we use them to count past wrongs, and create groups, who follows the rules most, and who doesn’t, lifting some up, putting others down, we all lose.

Sometimes labels get applied to people like Bobby and Sally, at a very young age. And those labels can cause very real harm.

For we forget that each of us follow the ways of Christ sometimes, while other times we don’t. We all fall short on occasion. We are only human, after all.

Today’s text reminds us that transformation is possible, for anyone. Reminds us we’re all infinitely more complicated than a simple binary grouping or label contains. And reminds us that there aren’t two, or four, or eight or any other number of groups when it comes to our access to the divine.

For full and complete access, to the kingdom of God, which our Lord desires for each of us, follow Christ by doing this one thing, which erases all the rest of what we’ve ever done.  And then asks just this.

Amen.

Remember Karate Kid? The classic 1984 film starred Ralph Macchio, William Zabka and Pat Morita, who played the infamous Mr. Miyagi.

In it Macchio’s character, Daniel LaRusso, is the good guy, and definitely the underdog. He’s the new kid in school, has few friends, and keeps getting beat up. The karate teacher, or sensei that Daniel pairs up with, Mr. Miyagi, believes karate techniques should be for self-defense only.  And can lead, ultimately, he suggests, to a path of inner peace.

Zabka’s character, Johnny Lawrence, is the bully nemesis, the bad guy. He’s a member of the rough and tumble Cobra Kai dojo. A group that lives by a simple code.

Strike Hard.
Strike First.
No Mercy.

The two seemingly couldn’t be more different. Fights between the two groups pop up again, and again, and again.

The film centers on a narrative of who, or what, is the greatest.

Which student is the greatest, Daniel or Johnny?
Which sensei is the greatest, Miyagi or Kreese?
Which techniques are the greatest, strike first, or defense only?

Karate Kid ends with a final match between the rivals for the All Valley championship. With the score tied 2-2 Daniel, leg injured and barely able to stand, assumes the memorable “crane” stance. Hands up, hurt leg lifted, he executes a front kick to Johnny’s face, scoring the tournament-winning point.

It’s a classic good-vs-evil 80s flick, beautiful in its simplicity. Good triumphs over evil. The bad guys get their just desserts. Justice is served.

The Greatest
The backstory from today’s text also has some controversy. Earlier in chapter 18, the disciples find themselves asking Jesus a question: Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?

Perhaps they too were trying to figure out some sort of pecking order.

Who is the greatest –
Is it Peter or Philip?
James or John?
Judas or Jude?

Their spars likely didn’t involve too many kicks to the face. Tho I bet they debated this question mightily.

As a band of brothers, it shouldn’t have even been a topic. The disciples had the same sensei, after all. There would be no karate match to settle this dispute.

Instead of answering the question directly – hey Peter, you’re it – Jesus calls over a child as an example. Unless you change and become like a child, Christ says, you’ll never fully experience this thing called heaven. For whoever becomes humble, like this child, it is they who are greatest in my realm.

The disciples couldn’t have seen that coming. Looking to figure out who’s number one Jesus called over a little kid? And tells them to be humble, like a child?

Where’s the competition to settle this, once and for all?

Filled with pride and ego, the disciples, and their very human desire to dominate one another, had much to ponder.

Cobra Kai
Last week my wife and I stumbled on this phenomenal follow up to Karate Kid, a series called Cobra Kai. It continues the storyline of Daniel and Johnny, three decades later. It’s a machismo soap opera, set to a 1980s soundtrack with a healthy dose of nostalgia. Aka wonderful. Check it out on Netflix if you’re curious.

In it, Daniel, now in his early 50s, owns a successful car dealership; every customer gets a free bonzai tree. He lives in a big house, and is happily married with two well-adjusted kids. For him life is good.

Johnny’s path over this time yielded a different result. He’s a handyman who can’t keep a job. Lives in a small apartment. Is Divorced. A deadbeat dad. And he likes to drink a little too much.

Initially, it seems the good and evil binary for the two characters still holds true. One where the good guy prospers, the bad guy just can’t seem to pull it together.

Yet as the Cobra Kai storyline develops both characters become more nuanced.

First Johnny saves a high school kid from getting beat up, and later agrees to help him learn karate. He then starts his own dojo, which attracts local high school kids that are bullied. Johnny wants this dojo to be different than the one he trained in as a youth. Slowly you find yourself rooting for Johnny to change.

Daniel learns of the new Cobra Kai dojo and basically loses his mind. “Not them, I know what they stand for!” he says. “They’ll never change!” So Daniel starts his own karate team, complete with those great wax-on, wax off techniques of old. But in the process, he forgoes his day job and car dealership. As a result, his marriage begins to suffer.

We learn there is no completely good guy. There is no fully bad guy. Both have good qualities. Both have flaws. They are human, after all.

At the heart of this story is their rivalry, 34 years in the making. Often it doesn’t seem like the rivalry will ever end. But it almost does. Twice.

In one scene Daniel and Johnny go out for a drink, soon realizing how much they have in common. Both grew up without a good father. Both were bullied. They begin to bond. Forgiveness, over past wrongs, begins. But then a plot twist and boom, the seeds of forgiveness go dormant. The two become bitter rivals again.

In another scene, Daniel and Johnny end up on an impromptu double date, and bonding begins anew. They’re smiling, reminiscing, laughing, even shaking hands. Could they become friends? The possibility of forgiveness, and reconciliation in that moment is palpable. But then another plot twist, and there they go, back to the same old spats. Opportunity lost, once more.

The more you watch the more you wonder – will the two ever fully forgive? Will they finally be able to move on? Is a peaceful existence for them even possible? Stay tuned for the next season. But for now? The rivalry lives on.

Forgiveness
After all the disciple’s infighting over who was greatest, there couldn’t help but be some tension among the 12.

Hurt feelings.
Bitterness.
Anger.

For the competitive spirit, among them, about who was the greatest, never fully went away.

With this backdrop, Peter realizes something has to give. After enough of the same old same old arguments, he decides it’s time to move on. Forgiveness is in order. And he wants, ultimately, to do it right.

So Peter asks Jesus a question. If someone sins against me, how often should I forgive? Up to seven times?

At first blush that sounds like a good number. It’s a complete number. A perfect number. Peter knew Jewish teachings; extend forgiveness no more than three times, and you’re good. But Jesus spoke so much about forgiveness the number must be more now, he thought.

Surely adding four more to the three would be enough. Right?
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Jesus responds with a much higher metric, seventy-seven, or in some translations seventy times seven. Which is a heckuva lot more than Peter’s first guess.

When may we stop forgiving those who offend us repeatedly? For Christians, the answer is crystal clear: never.

For God is a God who forgives completely.
To model Christ, we are called to do the same.

All day, every day.
24/7/365.

When it comes to forgiveness try keeping those numbers top of mind.

Unforgiveness
To drive home the point Jesus tells a parable. And it’s downright absurd; an ancient soap opera, in it’s own way, if you will. A king looked to settle accounts with his people. One person owed an unimaginable amount. The amount was so much it would take them over 30,000 years of labor to pay it back. Which is impossible. Having pity on him, the king forgave the entire debt. That’s a lot of forgiveness.

The man who had just been forgiven such a large sum then came upon another debtor. One who owed him about 100 days of labor. The forgiven man took the debtor by the throat and demanded payment. The debtor begged for mercy, but was refused, and put in prison.

When the king heard this, he sent for the forgiven man. “I wrote off the debt because you pleaded with me. Why did you not have mercy on another that owed so little, as I had mercy on you?” The king then banished the man from the kingdom, until his debt had been fully repaid.

To be clear, it is never the king’s desire to punish the one he forgave. Nor is it God’s desire to punish us. Comparing 30,000 years of debt to 100 days, with the former forgiven, while the latter is not, is an absurd tale. A tale designed to drive home a point.

We are to forgive –
In all things;
Without exception;
Without limit.

Just as we have been forgiven so very much.

True Greatness
We love our rivalries, don’t we? Our culture is practically built around them. Daily we compare ourselves, and the groups we identify with, to others. Sometimes banter about who is the greatest is harmless, even fun.

The greatest burger in Ames? Café Baudelaire. Change my mind.

The greatest college football team in Iowa? Sorry Hawkeye fans, but I’ve got a bold prediction: the Cyclones will win more football games this year. I personally guarantee it ?

Today marks the first Sunday of NFL football. Again, sorry Vikings fans. Apologies Packers peeps. The Bears, unabashedly, are the best. For now tho, let’s leave the Chiefs out of that comparison.

Yet when we compare our –
Wealth,
Politics,
Religion,

with others, in an attempt to determine which is the greatest, we’re going to lose.

And inevitably it causes harm to someone, or some group.
Emotionally,
Financially,
Spiritually,
Physically.

As with the Karate Kid, it’s easy to fall into a good vs. bad binary. Where, on the surface, at least to us, the difference between the good side and the bad side is plain as day. In that oversimplified narrative, the side we’re on is always the greatest.

But that’s Hollywood. Or perhaps reality tv.  That’s not reality. At it definitely isn’t Christianity.

For we all have the image of God baked right into us. Both –
Daniel and Johnny,
Peter and Judas,
Democrat and Republican.

Each of us fully sinner, fully saint. With no one person or group purely in the right or the wrong. Our world is, after all, infinitely more complex than any simple binary can contain.

Letting Go
When we find ourselves playing that age-old game of who-is-the-greatest, remember the words of Christ.

Unless we change, and become like a child, we’ll never fully experience this thing called heaven. A child, fully reliant on the Father, full of humility, modest in their sense of importance.

When we take that first step, with humility, we’ll begin to see more clearly who we need to forgive, and who we need to seek forgiveness from. And, like Peter, we may find ourselves asking, how many times, oh Lord, must I forgive?

I mean really Lord, haven’t I already forgiven enough?

Scripture is clear –
Forgive completely,
Without ending,
Expect nothing in return.

From the moment we rise, to the time when our day is done.

24/7/365.

Close
Collectively, we’ve got our work cut out for us, in the coming months and years. The focus on what is great on this plain of existence – at the expense of the greatness we look to above has caused very real harm.

As Christ-followers we know better.

For when we embody Christ’s humility and unending forgiveness, true healing becomes possible. For then, and only then, will we live fully into the kingdom to which we have been called. Peacefully, alongside countless others. Today, tomorrow, forever.  Amen.