Son of Man

Niccolò Machiavelli was a Renaissance era philosopher, politician, and writer. His writings greatly influenced modern political science. The following is an edited excerpt from The School of Life’s YouTube video on his views.

Machiavelli believed that to be effective, political leaders needed to be ruthless and tyrannical, not empathetic and just. His book, The Prince, is a short manual of advice for princes on how not to finish last. And the answer was never to be overly devoted to acting nicely. and to know how to borrow every single trick employed by the most dastardly, unscrupulous and nastiest people who have ever lived.

Machiavelli knew where our counter-productive obsession with acting nicely originated from: the West was brought up on the Christian story of Jesus of Nazareth. (He was) the very nice man from Galilee who always treated people well.

But Machiavelli pointed out an inconvenient detail to this sentimental tale of the triumph of goodness through meekness. From a practical perspective, Jesus’ life was an outright disaster. This gentle soul was trampled upon and humiliated, disregarded and mocked. Judged in his lifetime and outside of any divine assistance, he was one of history’s greatest losers.

Possible Preaching Angle:

What Machiavelli (and so many others) fail to take into account is that the gentle Lamb becomes a Lion. After the seeming “defeat” of the Cross, our resurrected Lord will return in great power and glory to reign over the earth. He was exalted by the Father because of his willingness to humble himself and take on the form of a servant.

Since 1939, Stan Lee created or co-created some of the world’s most popular superheroes. His super-human imagination gave birth to Black Panther, Spider-Man, the X-Men, Thor, Iron Man, the Fantastic Four, the Incredible Hulk, Daredevil, and Ant-Man, just to name a few.

Of course, the world has no shortage of storytellers, but Lee was something of a mutant in the field. The Avengers series alone has generated more than $10 billion in ticket sales at the box office since 2008. So, what set his stories apart from the rest? Lee was able to tap into deeply rooted human instincts.

He explains his secret in a 1984 interview with ET:

The whole formula … was to say: Let’s assume that somebody really could walk on walls like Spider-Man, or turn green and become a monster like The Hulk. That’s a given; we’ll accept that. But, accepting that, what would that person be like in the real world if he really existed? Wouldn’t he still have to worry about making a living? Or having acne and dandruff? Or his girlfriend jilting him? What are the real problems people would have? I think that’s what made the books popular.

We all know we need a superhero to rescue us from our enemies and from calamities. But we simultaneously want this hero to be someone with whom we can identify. There are two instincts woven into our fallen nature: the knowledge that we need someone to save us and the deep desire for another to understand our struggles. Lee was also well-known for his cameo appearances inside the stories he had written. Each film since X-Men in 2000 (until his death in 2018) has featured a brief incarnation of the author.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Stan Lee wasn’t the first to write himself into his storyline. Jesus did not simply rescue us from afar. He wrote himself into our story. He became a man and subjected himself to all the tyrannies of a fallen world.

In describing the incarnation Jill Carattini wrote:

Novelist Kurt Vonnegut once said of one of his most recurrent characters, “Kilgore was the only character I ever created who had enough imagination to suspect that he might be the creation of another human being. He said, ‘The way things are going, all I can think of is that I’m a character in a book by somebody who wants to write about somebody who suffers all the time.’”

In one scene Kilgore’s haunting suspicion is unveiled before him. Sitting content at a bar, he is suddenly overwhelmed by someone that has entered the room. Beginning to sweat, he becomes uncomfortably aware of a presence disturbingly greater than himself. The author himself, Kurt Vonnegut, has stepped beyond the role of narrator and into the book itself, and the effect is as bizarre for Kilgore as it is for the readers.

Vonnegut came to explain to Kilgore face-to-face that his life is all due to the pen and whims of an author who made it all up for his own sake. In this twisted ending, Kilgore is forced to conclude that apart from the imagination of the author he does not actually exist.

The gospels tell a story that is perhaps as fantastic as Vonnegut’s tale, though with consequences in stark contrast. The Gospel of John begins with a story that is interrupted by the presence of the author: “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. … All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. … And the word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a Father’s only son, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:1-15). The Word became one of us and moved into the neighborhood. But in this story, the presence of the author is not our demise but our inherent good.

There was no question he loved her. He was absolutely bedazzled by her. Surprising, really, because she was plain, maybe even… well, (to someone else perhaps) disappointing. But then, he himself was a poor man who didn’t have even two coins to rub together. He wasn’t especially handsome, either. But he was good… a good and godly man, and he swept her off her feet, and won her heart. What makes that ordinary story extraordinary is the rest of the story.

The story—told by Soren Kierkegaard —actually begins, “Suppose there was a king who loved a humble maiden.” He was a great king and he could have whatever he wanted. Every statesman feared his wrath, every foreign state trembled before his power; they would have all sent ambassadors to the wedding.

He realized that if he asked his courtiers they would say, “Your majesty is about to confer a favor upon the maiden for which she can never be sufficiently grateful her whole life long.” That was the problem! Even if she wanted to come with him, he would never know for certain if she would have loved him for himself. So he wrestled with his troubled thoughts alone.

Finally, he decided. If she could not come up to his high station and be sure to love him freely, he must descend to hers. And he must descend stripped of his royal power and wealth, for only then would he know if his beloved loved him freely, as equals. So he laid aside all his power and privileges, and came to her as her equal, to win her love.

British pastor, Matthew Hosier, writes about a missionary friend who moved to a Muslim majority nation:

When we first moved to the Middle East we heard that on festival days everyone dresses in their best clothes and goes to visit their relatives and neighbors to celebrate. So, for our first Eid festival we carefully cleaned our apartment, dressed up in our best clothes, got some sweets and chocolates which are traditional to hand out to visitors and waited in our house. But no-one came to visit.

Another missionary explained what we did wrong: "On festival days, the small visit the big, and the big give out presents." For example, everyone in a family visits their eldest brother, or their parents, or grandparents. When they arrive they would kiss the hand of the older person to show respect and honor. The host would then care for their guests by feeding them, serving them, and giving them gifts like good quality chocolate, money, or other presents. As newly arrived foreigners without social standing or relatives, naturally no-one came to visit us. We are considered "small" by the culture, so we are the ones who need to do the visiting.

This incident made me ponder the awesomeness of the incarnation. In every other religion, humans (the small) try to visit God by their own strength and good works. But as much as we try to dress up nicely, we cannot be clean enough to enter his house without polluting and disrespecting it.

In the incarnation God decided to play the role both of the "small" and of the "big." He humbled himself totally to become "small" so that he could visit us in our squalid house. But also as the "big" he played the role of host and gave gifts—atonement, the Holy Spirit, and clean clothes—which means that as believers we are now appropriately dressed and thus free to enter his house without disrespecting it.

In March 2002, the former ruler of Afghanistan, the 87-year-old Mohammed Zahir Shah, returned to his homeland after 30 years of exile. Here's how an article in the Chicago Tribune described his grand and glorious welcome:

On Thursday, thousands of invited guests lined up for hours at the airport and people gathered on the streets leading to a refurbished seven-bedroom villa to see the former ruler. Delegations arrived from across Afghanistan's 32 provinces. Governors and their advisers, members of women's groups carrying posters of the king, most of the interim administration, royalists, warlords, men in turbans and others in suits all converged on the pockmarked runway where shells of bombed airplanes lay. Two red carpets were laid out. The newly trained honor guard was on hand, and young women and children in traditional embroidered dress greeted Zahir Shah with flowers and poems.

I hope you're thinking of the contrast when Israel's Messiah was born, when he came to his own people.

We do not always get a simple, satisfying answer to all of our questions about suffering. In a 2014 testimony about his experience with a debilitating disease, former Wheaton College Provost Stan Jones provided a helpful perspective on all the questions about our suffering that we find it difficult or even impossible to answer. He said:

Long ago, I read a book about suffering, and the author made a point that I have had to return to time and time again. He said most of our why questions about suffering are ultimately unanswerable. God does not seem to be in the business of answering the why questions, and most of our philosophical responses to the question of suffering amount to various forms of taking God off the hook for the problem of suffering. But this author pointed out that God doesn't seem to be interested in getting off the hook. In fact, the answer of God in Jesus Christ to the problem of suffering is not to get off the hook at all, but rather to impale himself on the hook of human suffering with us in the very midst of our suffering.

When trouble comes and places a giant question mark over our existence, we should remember Jesus and the empathy of the Cross.

In his everyday life, Charles Foster is a respected veterinarian, a practicing lawyer, and a teacher at Oxford University in England. But as noted in his book Being a Beast, Foster also has an unusual practice. Every so often Foster tries to live like a badger. Yes, like one of those dark-dwelling, tunnel-making, rodent and worm-eating mammals. Usually he does this alone, though for a few days he went with his eight-year-old son, Tom. On a friend's farm, they made a human-sized badger home, a 15-feet long hole that they would sleep in. Charles says he's probably spent six weeks living underground like this over the years, sleeping during the day, awake at night like real badgers.

For Foster the main part of living like a badger involves getting low to the ground, crawling around on his hands and knees. He also blindfolds his eyes (because badgers' eyesight is terrible) and eats earthworms (since 85 percent of a badger's diet consists of worms).

Now as strange and even repugnant as this sounds, think of something even stranger and potentially more repugnant—the God of all creation who exists in perfect beauty and splendor becoming a human being and living on our fallen planet—and there was no escape for a full human lifetime. Jesus Christ came to us not just as an interesting nature experiment. Nor was he repulsed by us. He came out of love to rescue us from our sin.

The Jewish magazine Moment asked a number of Jewish writers, professors, rabbis, artists, and actors the following question: "What does the concept of the Messiah mean today?" Here are some of the responses:

• Amoz Oz, novelist: "He may be around the corner, but that's where he should always be …. In the Jewish tradition … sitting idly waiting for the Messiah is a sin."
• Rabbi Peter H. Schweitzer: "Years ago, a popular evangelical bumper sticker read, "I found it." The Jewish version would read, "I'm still looking for it."
• Harris Lenowitz, literature professor: "Who at different times in their life hasn't had a belief … that someone, a messiah, can help them and help the world? And the messiah is the biggest answer to the biggest single question: 'Does God care about me?'"
• Lucette Lagnado, reporter: "People have stopped believing in God, in the possibility of miracles, in the mystical, and in that most mystical belief of all—the idea that somebody's going to come along and make the world all better. I think that's a sad development of the modern world."
• Deb Margolin, playwright and professor: "Most people think the Messiah has already come, but Jews are waiting. It could be anybody …. It's a very sexy idea. There's a blind date with the sacred that awaits you at any moment."
• Ruth Messinger, CEO of Jewish World Service: "The Messiah doesn't connote that some entity, deity or event will suddenly arrive and change the circumstances in our lives …. That's a notion of childhood wish fulfillment."
• Jack Dann, science fiction writer: "Twenty years ago I would have said that the idea of a messianic message was dying out in the popular culture, that it was being overtaken by a more sophisticated secularism. Obviously I was mistaken. More and more people seem to be embracing the idea that a messiah will appear to fix everything."
• Mayim Bialik, neuroscientist and actress: "The concept of a messiah is a general … notion that we are partners in making the world better, in moving the world forward. The Messiah is progress, participation, suiting up and showing up for life."
• Samuel Heilman, sociology professor: "For most Jews, the messianic idea has receded; it's not on the top of the agenda, and they don't see history as inexorably moving to that day."

Possible Preaching Angles: (1) Use these quotes to set up a sermon on evangelism, especially with our Jewish friends. There is a huge difference between Christianity and Judaism—Jews are still waiting for the Messiah (or some of them have given up on the Messiah), while Christians believe that the Messiah has come and is still alive. (2) You could also use these quotes to illustrate the character of Christian hope: Christ has come; Christ is alive; Christ will come again. (3) Use these quotes when preaching on Jesus as Christ and Messiah.

In Portland magazine, a priest at a Catholic church in Portland, Oregon, tells a story about a street person named Big Ben who came daily to the church. He writes:

One Christmas Eve we decided to have a special café evening [to minister to the homeless]. An unusually large number of people came. At 9:00 we were down to the last pot of soup, though the hungry line still wove around the block. By 9:30 we were down to the last bowl, and there was Big Ben, face alight with his toothless grin. We filled his bowl to the brim, much to his delight, and that was the last of the last of the soup.

As Ben made his way to the table in the corner, a tiny teenage boy whom none of us had seen before appeared. He looked like he had slept in mud. He was shivering for lack of a coat and his left eye sported a nasty bruise. Seeing that the last of the soup was served, his eyes grew large and it seemed he was going to cry, but he didn't. God knows how long he had waited in line only to find no soup. Some of us were reaching for our wallets when Big Ben appeared with his bowl and handed it to the boy. He then put his hand on the boy's cheek and caressed it as a father would caress his son's, and then mussed the boy's hair, giggled, and wandered off.

It was a tender moment that stood in contrast to the steel, concrete, and cold that too often embrace those without hearth and home. It was a moment that knitted us together a little more tightly, and made me proud of my species. And it made me see, maybe for the first time, why God wanted to be human.

In an article for Christian Standard magazine entitled "Carols for Any Season of Suffering," Matt Proctor reflects on the Incarnation:

My 5-year-old, Carl, and my 3-year-old, Conrad, love it when I dress like them. After they put on jeans and a blue T-shirt, they'll come ask me to wear jeans and a blue T-shirt. When I do, they have a saying. They will survey me, survey themselves, and say, "Look, Dad—same, same." For my birthday, Carl bought me a North Carolina blue mesh shirt … because he has a North Carolina blue mesh shirt. We could be "same, same."

When I play living room football with my boys, Conrad will not let me play standing—so big and scary and towering above him. The theological term for this is "completely Other." Instead he insists I get on my knees. When I am down at eye-level, Conrad puts his hand on my shoulder and says, "There. See, Dad—same, same." They like it when I enter their world ….

This summer, I scraped my leg working on my house. When Conrad fell down and scraped his leg, he pointed at my scab, then showed me his and said, "Hey, Dad—same, same."

Here's the point … God himself has felt what we feel. In the Incarnation, he chose not to stay "completely Other." He got down at eye-level, and in the Incarnation, God experienced what it's like to be tired and discouraged …. He knows what it's like to hurt and bleed. On the cross, Jesus himself prayed a psalm of lament: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Psalm 22:1).

In your pain, you may be tempted to say, "God, you have no idea what I'm going through. You have no idea how bad I'm hurting." But God can respond, "Yes, I do." He can point to your wounds and then to his own and say, "Look: same, same. Me too. I have entered your world, and I know how you feel. I have been there, I am with you now, I care, and I can help." That is what Christmas is all about.

Used by permission of author.

When pastor and writer Clark Cothern was five years old, he thought college presidents were powerful, frightening beings. That is, until one stooped low to spend time with him. He writes:

What I saw of college presidents I saw from floor level, as I played on the other side of my mother's desk in the administration building at Grand Canyon College (now University) in Phoenix, Arizona. My Mom was the Dean of Women at the time.

I would watch as students walked slowly down the hall toward the president's office and stop. They would rub their sweaty palms on their pants or skirts, take a deep breath, straighten their shoulders, and knock. The door would creak open. That's when I would catch a glimpse of the president's shiny, black wingtip shoes. A steady, strong hand would reach through and shake the trembling hand of the student. The student would then disappear inside the mysterious chamber known as "The President's Office."

I figured that walking into that room must be pretty much like going before the throne of judgment. It was a terrifying thoughtthat is, until the day the president stooped into my world.

I was playing with my toy car in the hall outside his office when the door opened. There they werethose shiny, black wingtip shoes. The next thing I knew, President Robert Sutherland, the biggest man on campus, dressed in his pinstriped, three-piece suit, knelt down. He placed the knee of his crisply creased trousers on the hallway floor. "May I have a turn?" he asked.

After we played cars together, President Sutherland asked if I would do him the favor of calling him "Dr. Bob." That's the day my opinion about college presidents changed.

I can see how some people might think God is a powerful, frightening being. Yet after I met him, my opinion about him changed, too. John 1:14 says, "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us." When he stooped low into my world, Dr. Bob helped me understand that verse a little better.

He became what we are that He might make us what He is.