Falling Back Through Ourselves

Office Space is one of those deeply gratifying stories where the main character lives out all the things you’ve felt but are afraid to act on. He quits his job without leaving it, and makes a whole movie out of breaking all his own rules with reckless abandon. I think it speaks to the frustration we all feel as we not only ‘run to stand still’ but seemingly ‘run to fall behind slowly’. Is there another way?

The words of Jesus echo from the past with his talk of an inside out, upside down and backward way of doing things. The greatest must become the least, the first will be last and you must live to give instead of get. All His teachings in that direction feel poetic but do any of us really think you can climb further up by letting yourself fall backwards?

Pan’s Labrynth is the story of a lost princess who’s only way home is by proving she still is the princess she once was. It’s an interesting statement – that you don’t prove you are a princess by sitting on a throne but by deserving to. She’s given three challenges as a test of her virtue – not so that she can pass the three challenges, but to see if she will choose to fail them for the right reasons. At the climax of the story she’s forced to choose between her way home and the harming of an innocent. Only after she gives up on her only hope for herself does she realize she has passed the true test. Only a princess would rather die than harm an innocent.

I think we face a similar challenge. Born to wealth and privilege (in global terms), we are the princes and princesses of planet earth. We live in palace North America. A whole planet dreams of the opportunities we don’t even notice any more. Just consider all the things you thought you’d do if you suddenly became fabulously wealthy. Now turn around and realize that compared to the vast majority of everyone else alive, you already are. Will you now do what you always thought you would?

Will you do as Pan’s princess did? Will you fall backward through wealth and privilege and give it up for the benefit of someone else? Or will you continue to claw your way forward in the never ending quest for more?

According to Jesus, one of the greatest lifestyle challenges is that you grow to the place where you put a towel around your waist and willingly touch the dirtiest part of someone else’s life in the posture of a servant. It’s what Jesus did when He washed His disciples' feet. Stunning. God washing feet. What a radical view of royalty.

My career has put me in contact with all kinds of market place leaders, thinkers, influencers and those in prominent positions. The most compelling examples are always those who could wrap themselves in privilege but choose not to. The most compelling examples are always those who have status but are not conscious of it. They fall backwards through privilege and land in the place of sacrifice. They’ve given me a more compelling thing to aim at and I aim at it every day.
Before you ever see the throne which awaits you, the God of endless love and wonder wants to give you a chance to deserve some part of it. It’s His hope that your life will tell His story. Not one of sloppy grace where you just ‘got lucky’. But a more difficult grace which allows you to get up and start to make great choices for yourself and discover your true identity through courage and sacrifice. Try it. Lean back a bit – away from the normal direction of privilege, go past the point of balance and let yourself fall through it so that you land on your knees serving someone else. Who knows? It may just surprise you.

I hope you have a great week,
Chris