How do you achieve the good life? What does it look like?
In the time of ancient kings and queens, the good life probably looked a lot like sitting in the presence of royalty. People who found a way to sit in the royal courts and found a way to slip into royal favor are the people who achieved the ancient world’s version of the good life. As they sat to the right or the left of the king, they presented themselves as favored, honored, and wealthy.
It is not too different today. I vividly remember a conversation from High School where my friends and I discussed our run-ins with fame and fortune. One friend recounted standing in front of Weird Al Yankovic while getting a frozen yogurt at the mall…remember them…malls? He dropped some money and the man behind him picked it up. When he turned, he recognized the iconic look of Weird Al and began to ask, “Are you…” Weird Al simply replied, “Yes, yes it’s me.”
That was a cool story that gave my friend a little boost in his popularity, but none of us could come close to matching the stories of a different friend, Jack (his name has been changed to protect his awesomeness).
Jack’s dad was the owner of a successful communications company. His family was rich and well connected...well, rich and well connected for people in a small town that is.
Jack had stories of eating supper with Donald Trump, before the time of Trump’s presidential aspirations. Jack had stories of eating with all kinds of people in the entertainment industry and it was fun to listen to these brushes with fame and hear each famous star's eating quarks.
Just as it was awesome for Jack to sit at the right or the left of famous stars, it was nice for me, as a friend, to sit at the right or left of Jack. My family was a poor family, and I figured that sitting one step removed from fame was probably all the better I would get in life.
Jack’s Dad paid his allowance in $100 bills, so from time to time Jack had no money for lunch at school because the lunch room refused to break his $100 bills. On multiple occasions, I, the poor kid, would pull out the few dollars I had and pay for the rich kid’s lunch. I was never paid back either, but, it was all good because I got to sit at the right or the left of one of the popular, rich kid.
I did not think I would ever achieve the good life…the fame…the nice house…the nice cars…the fancy coffee makers…the riding lawnmowers…you know, the good life; but at least I could sit close to the good life.
I did not realize it at the time, but I was simply echoing a desire that had been spoken long, long ago. It was the same echo that reverberated through the lips of James and John as they asked Jesus: "Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory."
They too wanted to be in the presence of greatness. They too wanted the good life, and all that comes with it. They too wanted to sit at the right or the left hand of royalty.
How do you achieve the good life? What does it look like?
Our notions of the good life usually has some sort of prosperity attached. Houses, cars, money, nice lawns, and a big, peaceful family.
You can find preachers out there who will give you promises of this sort of prosperity, if only you believe. “If only you believe that God is for you and God wants the best for you…if only you have faith that God is for you and not against you, O people of God, you will get the very real rewards of large houses and blessed families who life around nice lakes,” the preachers of prosperity declare.
“If you give a tax deductible donation to God’s ministry, you too can have a mansion just like me!”
But, Jesus preaches a very different form of the good life. Prosperity, for Jesus, has nothing to do with mansions or lawns or cars or any of that earthly junk.
That is because Jesus’ throne is a horrifying cross.
That is because those who sit to the right or left of Jesus are thieves who die with him.
Prosperity, for Jesus, is giving his life for someone else.
Prosperity, for Jesus, is dying for the sake of the sinful and stained.
Prosperity, for Jesus, is living a life in which you seek, not to be the one who sits in grand places and is served, but rather to be the one who does the serving.
For Jesus, the American dream of gaining good things and good standing is not the good life.
How would the world be different if we taught our children, not to seek for the house, car, and 2.5 children in the suburban dwelling family, but rather to seek out the forgotten and despised?
What if the good life was defined by dying for another rather than gaining for one’s self?
What if the good life was defined by a cross and not an advertising board?
What if the good life was defined by an anxiety ridden struggle for all that is good and loving, rather than the image of peaceful retirement?
What if the good life was defined by God and not by humans?
When James and John say that they indeed can drink the cup that Jesus drinks and can endure the baptism with which Jesus is baptized, they do not know what they are saying. They do not realize the struggle and pain that the good life can entail. They do not realize that the cup is a cup of blood and the baptism is a drowning into death.
But, in following Jesus, they will indeed experience both. "The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized,” Jesus promises in an eerie prediction of future, cross-like struggles.
The good life…the life of faith, after-all, is not a promise of the carefree existence, rather, it is the promise of unconditional love. Never forget that loving unconditionally is a struggle, and it comes with a cost. It cost Jesus his life so that we might have a life.
“For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many."
Jesus lived the good life. But, he did not have lots of possessions. He was not born into the life of royalty, and he did not have servants waiting on him at all times. He sat the right or left hand of no earthly power.
Neither did Jesus seek any earthly fame and, in fact, he told everyone he healed to be quiet about the event.
Even the undesired fame that he did gain was destroyed in very little time by a death penalty and a cross.
Still, Jesus lived the good life. He touched the untouchable, and they were changed. He forgave this sinner, and they were changed. He healed the sick, and they were changed. He led a band of no-faith nobodies and they were changed. He loved even the unlovable, and they were changed.
And, we are still changed by him today. Jesus still reaches us through the Holy Spirit, touching us with his love, and changing our lives. Jesus is the good life.
We are a people of the good life. We are a people who follow the one refuses to be served but rather serves. We follow the one who gives his life in exchange to save others. We follow the one who loves, even if it hurts. That is the good life after-all, giving of yourself, even if it hurts, so that others might be changed.
You have been given the gift of the good life in Jesus Christ. You are one who has been baptized into the self-sacrificing love of Jesus Christ, our Lord.
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