Who Chooseth Me

Reading through Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice” yesterday, thinking through it today in my shower (this is where I do most of my reflection) gave me some insight into biblical truths that I believe are worth sharing. Among the characters in the play is Portia, a young rich lady, whose father, prior to his death predetermined the means by which his daughter would find her suitor. Portia’s prospective husband was expected to choose from three caskets, the right one being the one that contained her portrait. One casket was golden with the inscription, “who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire”, the second one was a silver casket with the inscription, “who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves” and the last one was made of lead and had the inscription, “who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath”.

Three suitors are mentioned in the play, namely the prince of Morocco, the prince of Aragon and Bassanio. In the most “unlikely” event, Bassanio ends up choosing the right leaden casket, hence becoming Portia’s husband, and an heir to all the property her father left her. The prince of Morocco and the prince of Arragon chose the golden casket (which contained a carrion death) and the silver casket (which contained a blinking idiot) respectively.

Coming to think of it, I realized that these are the very choices that we are expected to make in our daily lives as human beings (let alone Christians), and the perspectives held by the three suitors (which made sense in their respective eyes) are ever with us.

A large percentage of humanity, like the prince of Morocco, are craving for the affluence offered by material possessions, and this has always been, and will always be there as long as Christ tarries. Most people’s greatest ambitions are based on getting good jobs, owning big houses and property, fleets of state of the art cars etcetera. Not that there is anything wrong with owning property and being rich, but when that becomes my primary pursuit in this life, I can bet my bottom dollar that I am headed down the drain… suffice to say this materialistic tendency has found its way into the church… and every time I cringe on my seat when, in a gathering I hear the shouts of “amen” and “yes” from the congregation that are supposedly meant to encourage or affirm a new age preacher lavishing them with the exact thing Paul warns in Philippians 3:18-19. Truth be told, such sermons only make us more of enemies of the cross than the one who hung on it. Holding onto material possessions is setting ourselves on a slippery ground, and many illustrations in the bible dissuade us from the same. 1 John 3:15-17 tells us that to love the world is enmity with God, echoing the words of our Lord in Matthew 6:24 that our allegiance to God and mammon is mutually exclusive.

The second lot are those, who by virtue of their considerable piety, would think they are deserving of some things more than others. Here, I am talking of committed Christians… those you will find faithfully serving in church, attending all meetings, giving their tithes and offerings and so on. To get a clue of what I am talking about, just listen to the kinds of prayers they make. You will hear them calling fire from heaven to consume their enemies (fellow human beings). All the prayers they make will always be focused on themselves and their immediate family. In most cases, they will remind God of what they have done for him (seemingly borrowing a cue from King Hezekiah – whose prayer also had some nasty repercussions). I can’t excuse myself from this list as I used to make such kinds of prayers at some point. When we get to this point, we are no different from the self-righteous Pharisee that Christ talked about in Luke 18:9-12. My point is not to deny that God cannot reward our commitment to Him with material possessions, but that our outlook is meant to be for the greater eternal reward. In fact in Mark 10:29-30, which we’ll talk about shortly, Christ promises material possessions to those who’ve left everything to follow him. However, if we make material possessions our motives for following Him, then we are missing the point. It is too small an ambition to live for. We are actually making a fool of ourselves, just as the arrogant prince of Aragon who came in with a fool’s head and left with two.

Finally, looking at Bassanio, who ended up winning, in my opinion, he was the most undeserving of this lady. He had his own myriads of peccadilloes, and his extravagance was out of this world. Yet he had the audacity to borrow money from Shylock in order to put up a show and woo Portia, with Antonio, Shylock’s arch enemy being the guarantor. To justify his actions he uses the illustration that when you lose an arrow, you shoot another arrow in the same direction watching keenly so you can recover at least the last one if not both. However, what intrigues me about Bassanio is his openness and willingness to reveal the skeletons in his closet. His attitude is that of humility, willing to expose his misdeeds even before Portia. At the time of making the choice, he is not fleeced with the outward appearance of the caskets. His choice is dictated by wise reasoning and careful consideration… and yes, his willingness to pay the cost pays him dividends… He not only gets the damsel, but her wealth as well.

“Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath”… Don’t these sound like the words of Christ Himself in Matt 16:24-27, Luke 9:23-26 and other scriptural illustrations? Following Christ demands that we die of our self on a daily basis. Our ambitions should be replaced by His ambitions for His kingdom, and this will never disappoint us. He tells us to seek first His kingdom and all other things shall be added unto us. We spend so much time and exhaust ourselves chasing after things that God would have otherwise provided if only we were in His will. He has promised that a worker is worthy of His wages, but this is something we never think about, expressing our lack of faith by not trusting Him to provide. Towards the last part of Matthew 6, Christ spends a big chunk of His sermon just explaining to us why we should not trouble ourselves with earthly things. I submit to you that if we are to truly live a fruitful, fulfilled life here on earth, we should be ready to hazard all that we have, and entrust it to Christ, knowing that He has what is best for us in store. And, for your information, it is eternal. We should not live for our own desires but for Him. Let’s be in the master’s business, shan’t we?

2 Timothy 1:12 “For this reason I also suffer these things; nevertheless I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that Day” (NKJV)