I have been insanely busy (no pun intended) getting my web design business launched in the past few months, and though I’ve wanted to post something here, I just haven’t had the time or energy. If you’re interested to see that side of my life, visit www.flexweb.ca. I hope you’ll enjoy today’s musical accompaniment, a song I wrote & recorded called “Crazy Love”.

(© 2010, Sandy Alexander, SOCAN)

Not many of us like the idea of being called “crazy”. It’s a word that gets tossed around quite a bit, and has come to mean many things. A fun-loving person with a “devil-may-care” attitude is often called crazy. Someone with huge, seemingly unattainable dreams may be labelled as such. Many call the disheveled, smelly people who shuffle along city streets talking to their invisible companions, crazy. (I am not advocating this, just stating what is true.)

But would we apply that label to Jesus? You might be familiar with the Francis Chan book called “Crazy Love”. Most of us wouldn’t feel comfortable calling Jesus “crazy”. Granted, Chan isn’t saying that Jesus is crazy, just that what he did is crazy – his love is crazy.

During his earthly life, the authorities tried to hang the label on him, or at least to suggest that his powers came from the devil. And he did do some kind of weird things – freaking out at the moneychangers in the temple, putting his fingers in a deaf man’s ears, using spit and dirt to heal blindness. The sign they nailed above him on the cross could easily have read, “Here is Jesus, the crazy troublemaker who claimed he was G-d and a King”.

Jesus didn’t care what people thought of him. He could never have carried out his mission if he had. I suppose you could say that he sealed his fate by the crazy, anti-establishment things he did. He didn’t waste his time sucking up to the religious leaders of the day. He invested most of his energy in nobodies, outcasts, sinners, lunatics and prostitutes. Jesus made himself of no reputation. He set aside his divine privileges. He chose the path that led to the cross. If his main concern was his own welfare and not ours, he would’ve turned back at Gethsemane.

I was reading a post this morning by Wendy Gritter over at Bridging the Gap that captures the essence of Jesus’ crazy love beautifully. Here’s an excerpt from it:

We have a Greek word that captures this idea of entering powerlessness called “kenosis”. This literally means self-emptying. And we see that for Jesus, this self-emptying meant that stripped himself of his status and the advantages that went with it, he gave up his privileges – his perks, and he willingly laid down his reputation. He did all of these things in order to fully identify with the creatures he had made – to live in solidarity with us. In particular, he demonstrated a solidarity with those on the margins, those who were excluded and alienated: lepers, Samaritans, women, those perceived and labeled immoral. Embracing this degree of identification allowed Jesus to feel our pain. To suffer our temptations. To be betrayed, misunderstood, rejected and lied about. To know the wound of extending love and having it not returned. He suffered these things in such radical subversion to the systems of religion around him that it got him killed.

I don’t think Jesus would mind being called crazy. In fact, based on his character and actions, I think he’d gladly embrace the label, because it aligns him with us – all of us. It’s not that he had anything personal against the religious leaders. He knew that their posture of self-importance was really just a different manifestation of humanity’s fallen nature. The trouble is, they saw themselves as holy and righteous, above the masses, entitled to special treatment and perks – because of their position. This is dangerous because it places a “middleman” between human beings and God, and perpetuates a hierarchy that he never intended – the very things Jesus died to abolish.

I want to be more like Jesus. I want his crazy love to invade and transform everything about me, because his crazy love in us is what touches and heals. As Christians, let’s get back to the Biblical truth that we are called to love people, not judge them. Judgement is God’s prerogative. Transformation is the Holy Spirit’s job. Our task, as humbling as it may be, is simply to love.