Touring Life

The Spot: Starbucks Valero,  2/20/2009, 12AM-2AM

Rush #1:  Objective Service (Who are the audience of our Service?) – In a community life, or even in our pre-school lives, we were already being taught of “small” concept such as “helping those who are in need!”   In a young untainted mind, this is not a challenge.  But with ours already driven by society-tweaked “truths” or media-accepted “norms”, this is next to impossible.

What has been discussed during our quick chat is about a religious community having to target a specific group, mga ladlad na bading, who are being discriminated by the society, to join a religious community and let them know that Christ loves them no matter what.

In one of the new testament’s gospels of Matthew,  what particularly caught my attention relating to the ultimate definition of service is with Matthew, the tax collector.  Below is the excerpt from the Bible:

 9As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” He told him, and Matthew got up and followed Him. ¹⁰While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and “sinners” came and ate with Him and His disciples. ¹¹When the Pharisees saw this, they asked His disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?”

 ^{12On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”}

Here Matthew relates his own call into service by Jesus: “As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. ‘Follow me,’ He told him, and Matthew got up and followed Him” (vs. 9). Interestingly, Matthew places this episode within a section of his book in which he is recounting various miracles of Jesus. Matthew surely realized that the transformation of his own life from a tax collector to a follower of Jesus was miraculous. “It is surprising that Jesus should call a tax-collector, but even more so that that man should be ready so promptly to leave a business so lucrative” [Thomas, 125]

In that culture, tax collectors were normally very prosperous. They would bid to the Roman government for the right to collect taxes and tolls. Then, having paid the government for this right, they were free to collect as much as they could in order to make a profit. Their actions to extract every penny they could on taxes and tolls made them very much hated. Certainly, the hatred they faced must have, in turn, engendered much hatred within them. Yet, through Jesus’ transforming power, Matthew became a man of love. Brothers and sisters, do not give up praying for your unsaved friends and relatives. The Lord can soften the hardest of hearts, transform the most corrupt of lives.

 This is a true miraculous transformation of a person for the service of God.  In our context today, the tax collectors are us sinners [hindi ang mga ladlad na bading!]  We must not be calling for service because of one’s sexual orientation [or how they particularly behave]! We must introduce Christ to everyone particularly us sinners who are in dire need of miraculous conversion! That is true service!

 Rush #2: Politicking in a Community (Voter’s Right?) – As much has been said already regarding this topic, essentially what needs to be understood is that in any organization (may it be religious such as ours), it must be leveled that when we exercise our right to vote (thereby placing some in a postion for service), it is also an automatic responsibity on our part to support the activities and agenda of the person who assumed power [or rather the office in service].  

Conversely, had you not exercised this right, this goes without saying that you have no right to promote unhealthy participation in a government [by black propaganda; or commenting how bad the service - everything must be constructive].  If you want something changed – level with the people in service and let them know your side by constructively providing suggestions and alternatives!

Hope this made sense.   Note that in the end — the true goal of one’s service is to pave for the community a path that one can walk on.  It is still in each and every person within the community’s ultimate goal to make the experience on that paved-path a worthwile [or a miserable] one!