God Takes a Downside-Up View of the World

Everywhere we turn in the Bible, we see God showing great concern for the people that those in power ignore or abuse.  He advocates for the poor, the widow, the orphan, the immigrant, the stranger.  He denounces leaders who abuse the needy and warns us not to ignore the needs of the least among us.

God takes a downside-up view of the world.

Here are some examples:

Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount/Plain

Jesus shows his downside-up view of life in the Sermon on the Mount/Plain:

• Blessed are the poor (Luke 6:20).

• Blessed are the hungry (Luke 6:21).

• Blessed are the meek (Matt. 5:5).

• Blessed are the peacemakers (Matt. 5:9).

• Blessed are those who mourn (Matt. 5:4).

• Love your enemies (Matt. 5:43-48).

• You can’t serve both God and Mammon (money) (Matt. 6:24).

• Do to others what you want them to do to you (Matt. 7:12).

Jesus in his parables and other teachings

This incident is part of a series of events in this part of Matthew’s Gospel where Jesus explains what I call Jesus's downside-up view of life (which is upside-down for those who are at the top of the social ladder):

• The greatest must become like a child (Matt. 18:1-5).

• God cares as much about the one stray person as the 99 who are safe (Matt. 18:10-14).

• The prayers of just 2 or 3 people can move heaven (Matt. 18:19-20).

• Forgiveness is not something we can choose to dole out in limited amounts — we are called to forgive to the utmost (Matt. 18:21-35).

• Men are not to look for reasons to divorce their wives (divorce could leave women economically devastated at the whim of a faithless husband) (Matt. 19:1-9).

• Anti-foreigner prejudice is to be rejected: a foreign woman is worthy of praise and assistance (Matt. 15:21-28).

• The kingdom of heaven belongs to the children, who are the lowest people on the social ladder (Matt. 19:13-15).

• Wealth, rather than being a sign of God’s favor, makes it hard to be saved (Matt. 19:16-30).

• The rewards of the kingdom are available to those who come late to Jesus as well as those who (think they) have followed God’s law from the beginning (Matt. 20:1-16).

• Those who wish to be first must be the servant of all (Matt. 20:20-28).

• God welcomes the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame to his eternal feast (Luke 14:15-24).

• If you ignore the needy who struggle for the basics of life, you should not expect to find a place in the Kingdom of God (Luke 16:19-31).

Jesus in the story of the Last Judgment

Jesus shows his downside-up view of life in the story of the Last Judgment:

• Come, you who are blessed by my Father (Matt. 25:34):

  • I was hungry and you fed me (Matt. 25:35).

  • I was a stranger and you welcomed me (Matt. 25:35).

  • I was in prison and you visited me (Matt. 25:35).

  • What you did to the least of these, you did to me (Matt. 25:40).

• Depart from me, you who are accursed (Matt. 25:41):

  • What you did not do to the least of these, you did not do to me (Matt. 25:45).

Jesus on the cross

When he was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus said that he could have defended himself with “more than twelve legions of angels” (Matt. 26:53) if he had chosen to do so.  Instead, he chose to give up his life for our benefit:

• He said that he, the Son of Man, came “not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).

• He said, “I am among you as the one who serves” (Luke 22:27).

• He demonstrated this servant attitude by washing his disciple’s feet (John 13:1-5).

And then he gave himself up to death on the Cross, staying true to his downside-up approach even to the end.

God in the Old Testament

God shows the same downside-up view of life throughout the Old Testament:

• The Lord hears the cry of the poor (Ps. 34:17/18; Ps. 69:33/34).

• Defend the oppressed (Ps. 72:3/4).

• Do not oppress the alien/stranger, the orphan, or the widow (Jer. 22:3; Zech. 7:10).

• Provide support for the poor (Lev. 25:35).

• Offer a helping hand to the needy (Deut. 15:7-8).

• Treat the immigrant like you treat a citizen (Lev. 19:33-34).

• Provide justice to the lowly and the destitute; rescue the poor and needy from the hand of the wicked (Ps. 82:3-4).

• If you close your ears to the cry of the poor, you will cry out and not be heard (Prov. 21:13).

• The fast I desire is that you end the injustice (Is. 58:6-11).

The challenge to us: Will we see as God sees?

God has shown us how He sees the world.  He has a special concern for those who the world cares the least about, precisely because the world cares so little about them and often doesn’t even see them.

We need to make an effort to see the world with the clear eyes of God.  The closer we are to the top, the harder that may be, especially if we live in a thriving city in a powerful nation.  We may need to force ourselves to see differently than the world we live in has trained us to see.

Yet Christians can do no less if they wish to follow God. The downside-up view is the only view worthy of the name of Christ.

We might ask ourselves:

• We who are Christians call Jesus Lord and claim to be His followers.  But do we think like Him?

• Do we put our priorities where His are?  Do we care for the least, the lost, the lowly, the left-out, the left-behind the way He does?

• Do God’s downside-up priorities show in our charitable giving, our work, our social activities, our church work, our political positions, our use of time, our everyday comments about what is going on in our society?

• How can we embrace more fully God’s downside-up view of our world?