Canter Bridge

Jesus taught an ethic of continuity. What a person does with the little stuff is a leading indicator of his conduct when opportunity becomes large.

‘Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.’ The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this, and they ridiculed him.

Money is so often the elementary school preparation for responsibility over lives and livelihoods. A checkbook makes for a fine pop quiz. An expense account stands in for a final exam. Bigger things wait upon graduation.

Jesus’ ethics stand over against the performance-based, self-aggrandizing morality that is reported to have characterized the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. Having virtually cornered the market on religious respectability, the Pharisees appear to have made hay on their good name.

Jesus had no truck with their hypocrisy. His scathing denunciation of their code boiled down to a call for consistency. He’d have more patience with them, no doubt, if their piety could be taken indoors, their compassion turned towards those whom their religious affection humiliated, their joy motivated by seeing the poor and lonely healed and included.

In ethics, a bit of continuity does a body good.

Godliness in the small stuff, ditto in the big. Muck and slime in the details, hypocrisy and ruin when opportunity knocks loudly, trailing responsibility in its shadow.