It is hard to believe that it has been Fifty years since The Jeffersons debuted on CBS. January 18, 1975, to be exact. This groundbreaking sitcom was actually a spin-off of another groundbreaking show, All in the Family. The Jeffersons were an African American family who became wealthy through their chain of dry cleaning stores. The theme song for the series, which opened each episode, summarized their story:
Well we’re movin’ on up, to the east side
To a deluxe apartment in the sky
Movin on up
To the east side
We finally got a piece of the pie
Fish don’t fry in the kitchen;
Beans don’t burn on the grill
Took a whole lotta tryin’
Just to get up that hill
Now we’re up in the big leagues
Gettin’ our turn at bat
As long as we live, it’s you and me baby
There ain’t nothin wrong with that
Well we’re movin on up
To the east side
To a deluxe apartment in the sky
Movin on up
To the east side
We finally got a piece of the pie
(Ja’Net Dubois)
Movin on up was the clear metaphor for obtaining not only financial success but the accompanying social status that the family eagerly embraced. An uphill battle, their new circumstances were hard won and a source of pride.
Our scripture for today is Luke’s account of Jesus teaching the beatitudes, the heart and soul of his life, his message and his witness. This teaching is a bit long and deep, so it is divided into this week and next.
Our passage for today is Luke’s account of Jesus’ preaching the beatitudes, providing a teaching similar to Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount, though Luke refers to it as the Sermon on the Plain. Luke begins his account with Jesus coming down from the mountain to a level place, where the people are. There is a lot of significance to these simple words. Ascending has long been a symbol of achievement, progress and blessing. We climb the corporate ladder in our careers. We move up in our social standing as we have more success. It seems to be part of our nature as humans to want to reach for what we cannot obtain. We reach for the sky, knowing we will never get there. Our society is fixated on moving up, not coming down. As the theme song for the Jefferson says “we’re moving on up, we finally got a piece of the pie.” Moving up is an achievement, they accomplished a goal. Coming down, as Jesus does in the passage, is seen in our culture as a regression or defeat. Lowering oneself is not a good thing. Here, Jesus comes down, to be on the same level as his disciples and the gathered crowd. In other words, Jesus starts off at a higher elevation and moves himself to be within the gathered body.
This passage lays out the heart and soul of Jesus’ life and his ministry. Luke tells us that Jesus came down from above to be among the people, Jesus coming down is the heart of the incarnation – God took on human form to be among us. Instead of being up there somewhere, God, in the person of Jesus, comes to be with us, not above us, but with us. Not unreachable but here, touchable. All one needed to do is reach out to touch Jesus. God is that close to us, always right here with us. And that is also the heart of not only Jesus’ ministry but our calling in ministry. To be among the people, to reach out in humility to those who are in need. In God’s kingdom, the goal is not to go higher but to go where we are needed.
In this teaching, Jesus speaks to blessings. The poor belong to God’s own realm. The hungry will not be hungry much longer. Weeping may spend some time with us, but joy shows up and that joy embraces all those who are excluded, rejected, reviled or defamed because of their connection to Jesus. The outcast, the ones others have tried to cut off, have a belonging that goes deeper than anything anyone could withhold. Their life situations have led them to be in the company of the prophets, those who have spoken with God. What makes them outcasts also brings them to a deeper relationship with God.
One thing I learned during my time as a missionary in South Africa was that the patients I visited, whether it be in a wood shack barely holding itself together against the elements, with holes and spaces letting the cold wind in. Or in a cinder block house with no heat, electricity or running water, these people had a faith that was so deep, so rich, so filled with the gospel, it was clear that they were in the company of God. I may have been there as their minister, but they showed me the way to a faith deeper than I had experienced before.
In these blessings, Jesus offers a lot of hope. First, they address the issues of real, everyday life. In the first century as today, families would be faced with decisions around money – what has to be paid right now, what can wait until there is more money. Jesus is telling the poor and the hungry that their material needs will be met. And they find a way to make it work, they get creative in their budgeting and find sources for food and other necessities.
Secondly, these blessings state what Jesus’ followers would have known from the Psalms “The earth is the Lord’s and everything in it, the world and its inhabitants too. (Psalm 24:1 Common English Bible) Everything and everyone on earth belongs to God and no one else, no exceptions.
Third, laughter rather than weeping, The Book of Ecclesiastes reminds us that there is a time for crying and a time for laughing (Ecclesiastes 3:4 Common English Bible). This is a time-honored promise of God changing how death shapes our experience of life. If we don’t know sorrow, we cannot know joy. Jesus is supplying a vision from the prophet Isaiah where the future breaks into the present. “The Lord God will wipe tears from every face; he will remove his people’s disgrace from off the whole earth, for the Lord has spoken.” (Isaiah 25:8 Common English Bible)
Finally, While others work to defame and exclude them, those bearing witness to Jesus’ relationship with God will have a good, even elevated, position in the community. God is the true source of respect and provides it through the healings and blessings Jesus offers. The people living in the economically poorest township in South Africa, people so destitute it seemed that it should have been hard to find hope, exuded a joy that is hard to find. Living in abject poverty opened them to see the joy that life brings.
This passage in Luke is challenging for us here in 21st century America. We see the poor and hungry as evoking feelings of sadness or possibly of gratitude thinking, “but for the grace of God, there go I.” No one wants to endure bullying or character assassination because of their faith, no matter how much closer it may bring us to God.
Our culture tells us we should strive to be wealthy, full, laughing and respected. This leads us to want to accept the status quo instead of Jesus’ version of blessings.
Could this be why Jesus also added those cautionary woes, offering us a warning about placing our trust somewhere other than in God? Blessings lead to us bearing fruit allowing us to be blessed. The woes remind us of what we are missing out on when we bypass the blessings. The blessings Jesus is describing offer a future that is more satisfying than staying with the status quo. But reality is, most of us would rather settle than strive for the blessing. Jesus’ way is countercultural. It was in the first century and it still is in the 21st century.
Jesus’ teaching prompts us to ask “Where do we seek security, where do we find trust?” The prophet Jeremiah tells us “Happy are those who trust in the Lord, who rely on the Lord” (Jeremiah 17:7 Common English Bible) In our reading from Luke, Jesus is telling us that God is worthy of our trust. Humans and the human way are not worth investing our time and ultimately our trust on, God is.
If you watched The Jeffersons, you may remember they faced all kinds of problems and challenges even after they moved. They were just experiencing them on a new level.
So where do you place your trust? In God or in our human way.