When we consider our core – our essence – there are a number of things worth taking into account.
Have you ever felt that someone has taken advantage of you? Why is it so important for us to not be taken advantage of? Why do we wish so deeply to experience fairness? Do you ever grow weary of having to live with a protective guard around you?
Humans also struggle with being the center of our worlds. Recognition for our accomplishments. Experiencing financial success and security. Personal fulfillment. Adulation from our peers. Our desire for trouble free lives. We protect our internal selves because we feel we cannot afford to lose control. There is little practical motivation for bending our will to the will of someone else.
The risk involved in bending before those who may take advantage of us is often just too great. Yet God wants us to subject our personal will to His eternal will. The idea that Jesus will ultimately come to have first place in everything is a foreign concept to most humans – but not to the Father (“He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.” – Colossians 1:18).
Within our checkered human history, there appears to be only One historical figure worthy of world Kingship. For authority to be absolute, it must be absolutely moral. This is the Story of the appearing of the Son of Man: Jesus the Nazarene. Despite His contemporary detractors – as well as those in our brief human history – Jesus is the One consistent moral authority in the cosmos. This is precisely because Jesus is God – and God (Jesus) made the world.
It is Jesus’ perfect example that spurs us toward the door of humility. If we can bend our will to our Creator’s will we have opportunity to “find ourselves by losing ourselves.” This is the paradox. We find it extremely difficult to trust others. This makes it a real challenge to bend before a Creator Whom we cannot see.
As we struggle with this paradox, the God Story tells us that Jesus has won His Kingship over the earth, and that one Day He will be installed as King over every living soul. We are made in the image of God. We have value. We have dignity. We matter. When we bend there is trust – and when we trust we are able to bend.