"The last shall be first"--A Halloween Lesson

An argument arose among the Apostles about which of them was the greatest.  Jesus, who looks into our hearts and knows what our intentions are, simply placed a child in their midst and stated that "whoever receives this child in My name receives Me and whoever receives Me receives the One who sent Me." (Luke 9:48)

I have to wonder if the Apostles weren’t as thick as bricks sometimes!  In this case, it sounds like John doesn’t understand, because he starts up with another question that to me sounds like he’s competing for Jesus’ notice with everybody else.  He says he has seen someone “not a follower like us” who is driving out demons in Jesus’ name, thinking that Jesus will rebuke him, but instead He replies, “Do not prevent him, for whoever is not against you is for you.” (Luke 9:46-50)

One must never be deceived by one's status or accomplishments. That is how Satan tried to drive a wedge between Job and God.  Satan failed, even though he went to such great lengths and reduced Job to a state of helplessness.

Often, we seem to forget this very important teaching of Jesus.  We assume that if someone is not Catholic or Christian in a way that we recognize, they cannot help us, or they oppose us.  While this may be true in some cases, in many cases the opposite is true.  Those who do not hinder us, help us in our mission much.  Today we have so many who are ready to bring suit against us for speaking out in faith--so many ready to take offense at our belief—ready to tell us of our foolishness and our naïveté.

But there are a great many whose prayers join with ours.  A great many people support what we do, but do not necessarily have the mission (or perhaps the courage, as it is in my case) to go out in the forefront of the battle.  Nevertheless, they quietly support our efforts with their prayers.

There are others as well; for instance, atheists who oppose the death penalty for the fetus in the womb—perhaps unlikely companions in being a voice for the voiceless.  For this service God blesses them; and even if they do not join us in prayer outside abortion clinics or make no public display at all, they do not oppose us, and they work in their own ways to accomplish the same end.

We should not assume that Protestant, Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu, or any of our brothers and sisters who do not aid us directly, necessarily oppose us.  Certainly some do, but not all.  And most are looking for the same thing we are.

We should strive to be supporters, not superstars.  Jesus said, "For the one who is least among all of you is the one who is the greatest" (Luke 9:48).  Only then will we be able to do as the Proverbs directs, "Incline your ear to me and listen to my teaching" (Proverbs 22: 17). 

If we are "arguing" about who is the greatest, we are not listening.

I am reminded of a lesson that I learned many, many years ago as a child out trick-or-treating on Halloween night with my brother Tom, my best friend Cal, and 3 or 4 of the other neighborhood kids.  This was in the day when it was still considered safe to let your 10, 11, and 12-year-old kids run around an unknown neighborhood in the dark (as long as you stayed together)!

We were out to get as much candy as we could: which is, incidentally, the whole idea of Halloween!  We all carried pillowcases to put our "stash" into. Our objective was to fill the pillowcases and then go back to the house and sort it out into what we liked and didn't like and trade with one another until everybody was satisfied with the booty.

As happens with kids who are together for any real length of time, some tempers flared and envy over who was getting more candy, who had the better costume, and even who shouted "Trick or Treat" the loudest were the cause of the tantrums.  I'll admit that I was a part of the problem until it came time to knock on the next door.  Then I was "all business" and the arguments had to stop.  After all, who would give candy to kids who were not behaving well?

Some in our "gang" didn't know when to stop however, and when we knocked on the door of one particularly mean-looking guy there was so much arguing going on that no one remembered to yell "Trick or Treat"!

The man asked in a booming voice, "Who's in charge of this group? Who's your leader?"  Everybody else was trying to claim the position, but I was afraid the “leader” would be in some sort of trouble, and I didn’t want that for myself or my brother.  I don’t know where the courage came from, but I only said, "Trick or Treat!" in the smallest voice I could muster, from about 5 feet behind the others.

The guy let out a huge laugh and said to me, "I can see you’re the leader! Only a real leader would stand at the back of the pack and come up with a plan to ACT like one and get the job done!"  He said it was easy to tell, “because ‘For the one who is least among all of you is the one who is the greatest!’", and you were the only one not claiming to be the leader.”    Then he said, "Since you're the leader, I'm going to give you the candy for your group and let you decide how to share it."  Here I was, only trying to see how much candy I could get, wearing a stupid costume I'm sure I was embarrassed to be wearing, trying not to be stand out, and this guy calls me a leader and throws responsibility my way as well! 

I was "taking the lowest place at the table" and I was "invited up to a place of honor" (Luke 14: 7-14).  By doing that, the man at the door that Halloween night taught me that from humility comes strength of character.