No One To Look Down On

God’s ways are not our ways. God’s thoughts are not our thoughts:

As high as the heavens are above the earth
o high are My ways above your ways
and My thoughts above your thoughts

Thus says the Lord in the Book of Isaiah, Chapter Fifty-five, Verse Nine. The truth of this Divine statement is nowhere more apparent than in today’s Gospel Lesson in which Jesus says, “the last shall be first and the first shall be last” (Mt.20:16). It is one of those Biblical texts in common usage, but on a superficial level. It is quoted more as a popular maxim than as serious Biblican instruction. We hear it repeated frivolously, in the manner of “Too many hands spoil the soup” or “Look before you leap.” The trouble with popular maxims is that they often are contradictory. For example, “Too many cooks spoil the soup” is countered with “Many hands make light work.” “Look before you leap” is countered by…