Matins Devotion: September 9, 2026
In one of the best scenes in one of the greatest films ever made, Lucky Day, Dusty Bottoms, and Ned Nederlander, AKA the Three Amigos, are discussing what they’re going to do with the 100,000 pesos they’ve been promised for what they believe is a movie they’ll be filming the next day. Lucky says he’s going to get a big shiny car that he can rub in the face of the Hollywood producer who recently fired them. Dusty says he’s going to party in New York and Paris and be a big shot for a while. Then Ned says he’s going to use the money to start a foundation for homeless children, at which point, Lucky and Dusty feel ashamed and start mumbling about how they were obviously going to do their fancy things after they did something similarly charitable.
It’s a funny scene because it gets to the heart of greed. When we consider the idea of being showered in money or power, our first thoughts are always “how can I glorify myself with this” and never “whom can I serve with this?” We all know whose faces we’d want to rub in our newfound glory. We know the people we’d tell off or humiliate with our fresh riches or authority.
But in sweet little Ned Nederlander’s comic response, as unintentional as I’m sure it was, we see a reflection of how God himself views the concepts of riches and power and glory. Jesus Christ had more of these things than we could ever fathom. He is the eternal Son of God, the One eternally clothed in His Father’s glory. Every radiant burst of light and majesty belonged to Him. But, as Paul tells us, He did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, meaning that He did not merely want to possess that glory, but He wanted to give you that glory. And so the God who had every right to rub His glory in your face took on your face. He took on the form of a servant, took on human flesh, suffered for you, bled for you. The glorious Son of God took on humiliation and scorn and rejection for you, the one who hated Him with your sins. And He did this all to forgive your sins, to wash you clean. He did this to wrap His arms around a homeless, lost, orphan child and to give you a home in His presence forever. All of God’s wealth and glory and power, Jesus Christ did not see these as things He could use to crush you. He saw them as things He could make your own when He made you His own.
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