Looking for Rosebud

Looking for Rosebud--March 2, 2018

"When John [the Baptist] heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, 'Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?' Jesus answered them, 'Go and tell John what you hear and see; the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me'." [Matthew 11:2-6]

Spoiler alert: it was his sled.

If you haven't seen Citizen Kane, the classic film by Orson Welles from 1941, and if, further, you are still planning on watching but just haven't gotten around to it, and if you want to remain surprised about the ending--really, the meaning, of the whole movie, well, read no further.  In fact, go out and find yourself a copy of Citizen Kane to watch over the weekend--there is a reason it is regularly called the greatest film of all time (well, really second behind The Princess Bride, but who's to quibble?).

All right, everybody else who's left has either seen the movie or doesn't care about a discussion of its ending, right?  Then let's roll up our sleeves and do a bit of theology.

The whole premise of the movie is that the famous fictional tycoon/newspaper magnate/would-be politician Charles Foster Kane (Orson Welles) dies after a storied life grabbing fame and power and prestige and influence, and his final utterance is the mysterious lone word, "Rosebud." And Joseph Cotten's character, Leland, is tasked with investigating into Kane's life story to find out what that last word could mean.  Who, or what, is Rosebud?  And why would this "Rosebud" turn out to be so important as to be a powerful, wealthy man's last word?  Was she a lost love?  Was it the name of a company he had owned?  A place where some important turning point in his career transpired?  A rival in the newspaper business?  For someone as "important" and "successful" as Kane, surely his last word must have been something of great significance... right?

Well, if you've seen the movie (or read the opening line of this devotion) you already know: Rosebud was the name, the label, on the top of his childhood sled, the one enduringly good and lovely memory from Kane's childhood.  We in the audience see it in the final seconds of the movie, as remaining assorted items of Kane's estate are being burned as garbage, and there in the flames is the sled, which apparently he had held onto for all those years since childhood, clearly marked "Rosebud."  

The truth is there for the viewer, as plain as the words on the silver screen, and has apparently been right under everybody's noses the whole time.  The trouble was--everybody had been looking for something bigger, more important-looking, more valuable in terms of power, wealth, intrigue, or influence.  And instead it was a joyful memory from childhood--something that gave life and happiness to the young boy who would grow up to be Charles Foster Kane.  And as bitterly ironic as those last seconds of watching sled wood consumed by flames feel, that final shot of the movie reveals an important truth: sometimes the very thing you are looking for is right in front of your eyes, but you are unable to see it because you are looking for the wrong clues.

That could just as easily be the caption of this episode from Matthew's Gospel, too, except here John the Baptizer is Joseph Cotten's character, and his "Rosebud" to seek out is the promised one call the Messiah.  John knows the word "Messiah" well; he, like so many first-century Jews, were waiting for God to send this chosen, "anointed" (that's what "messiah" means, after all) figure in whom all God's ancient hopes and promises to Israel would be kept, and through whom God would redeem and restore all things.  And John had staked his life on the bet that Jesus was the Messiah he had been looking for... and then Jesus started doing and saying things that didn't look very Messiah-ish.  

For one, John has been a good and loyal supporter of Team Jesus... and here he is languishing in prison for having spoken truth to power and called Herod on his corruption and decadence.  Why hasn't Jesus busted John out... or taken down Herod... or better yet, usurped Herod and the Romans and crowned himself king to sit on David's throne and establish a divinely sanctioned royal dynasty for Israel?  Why hasn't Jesus done things that look... you know, powerful?  Command fire and lightning from the sky, maybe.  Gather up recruits and weapons for an armed resistance.  Start training soldiers for a messianic army of people who will "take back their country" and restore Israel's forgotten "greatness" again (whatever that might have meant).  Start decreeing new commandments and backing them up with divine firepower. Something that would confirm for John that he had bet on the right horse after all, and that God's chosen, anointed Messiah was going to spring John from jail and forcefully vindicate him in front of the pretenders like Herod.  Like Leland in the movie looking for the meaning of "Rosebud" in all the places of power, romance, influence, and wealth, and coming up empty, John was expecting to find the Messiah wielding armies and swords and divine fire.  And John is simply baffled that he hasn't found his "messiah" doing any of those things--my goodness, instead, he's sending out his followers unarmed town by town to bring his message all around (the story that immediately precedes today's passage).  You and I, of course, know the end of this story--Jesus really is the Messiah after all, but John has been looking for all the wrong signs.

When Jesus responds to the messengers that John has sent, he neither denies being the Messiah nor accepts the particular set of expectations John had for what the Messiah was supposed to do and look like.  Jesus just says, "Look in front of you at the way I do things: the sick are healed, the broken are restored, the dead are raised, and the poor are given good news. What does that tell you?"  He's practically saying, "Hey, tell Johnny boy to look at the words right in front of his eyes:  R-O-S-E-B-U-D."  Jesus is the Messiah; the trouble is that "the Messiah" isn't what John was expecting it to look like.  And from there, the question will be whether John is willing to give up his old mental picture in order to be in relationship with the real deal, or whether he will insist on holding onto his old preconceptions of what he wants the Messiah to be... thereby making his mental picture into an idol.

The same choice is in front of us, too.  We all bring our own mental pictures of the way Jesus should run things... of the ways Jesus should deal with problems in the world... of the kind of respectable religious stuff we want out of a messiah.  We all secretly wish Jesus would just do things our way, and then we could simply baptize our own mindsets, our own ways of thinking, and then we'd always be "right."  We have a way of wanting Jesus to come on to the scene, guns-a-blazin', and zapping bad guys (we will, of course, be only too happy to label for Jesus just who the "bad guys" are).  We want him to show the world that he's a "winner" with the usual hallmarks of "winner-dom" like power and prestige, wealth and weapons.  That's where we're looking for Rosebud, because that's where the world thinks all the important stuff happens. 

But Jesus doesn't do any of what we expect.  We would like a Jesus who guarantees that his followers will be safe, comfortable, and respectable in their communities... and instead we get a Jesus whose way leads through suffering, scandal, and risk.  We have this way of wishing for a Jesus who kicks down doors to rescue John the Baptizer, loads another clip with a satisfying click, and then takes out the Herods and Pilates and everybody else on our list of villains, a regular John McClane from Die Hard, but with a halo.  And Jesus has this way of stubbornly refusing to do or be what we wish him to be... and instead points us to a totally different picture of what he has come for--a picture of saving rather than destroying, a picture of serving as his way of ruling. He says, "Look at the sick healed, the poor given hope, and the dead raised."  And then he adds, as a sort of subtle dig back at John (and maybe at us when we want to remake Jesus in our own image), "Blessed is anyone who doesn't get offended over the fact that I'm not the action hero or respectable religious type that they were expecting."  Jesus doesn't apologize--not to John, not to us, not to anybody--that his way of being the Messiah may not fit with what we pictured.  He just continues being the kind of Messiah he has come to be--one without armies or weapons, one without wealth or political leverage, but only the power of a life given away in love.  That's where to find Rosebud.

We never quite find out what John the Baptizer did or thought when he heard his messengers' report about what Jesus said.  And maybe that is beside the point for a moment.  Whether John ever figured out what "Rosebud" meant before it went into the incinerator or not, the real question on this day is whether you and I will see the words right before our eyes.  That is to say, will we dare to let Jesus be himself, on his own terms, in the way he saves, or will we cling to the false movie-action-hero versions of him we have been fashioning, unaware we have made them into idols?

Will we look at what is right in front of our faces and see that the One we have been looking for has been there--giving life, rather than destroying it or using coercive force to get his way--all along?

Lord Jesus, help us to see you and your way before our very eyes. And keep us from falling for idols we have made on our own and given your name.