Look! It's Jesus!

"If you turn on any of my crew..."

The intense scene pictured above is from the 9th of only 14 episodes of the 2002-2003 television series, Firefly. The loveable scalawag, Captain Mal, has caught the man named Jayne in an act of treason...turning in a pair of fugitives from the evil Alliance that was part of the ship's crew. Jayne defends himself by saying, "It's not like I turned on YOU!"

The quick and angry response is, "You turn on any member of my crew, and you turn on me! You did it to me, Jayne! And that's a fact."

Sound slightly familiar to any Bible readers out there?

It's a reverse image of something Jesus said about feeding the hungry, clothing the needy, tending to the sick, visiting the lonely...

"If you've done it to the least of these brothers of mine, you've done it to me."

Kind of makes you want to think twice before avoiding eye contact with the Salvation Army bell-ringer, or hoarding all those perfectly good coats you'll never wear again, doesn't it? Kind of makes you wonder if the soup kitchen ought to be keeping kosher in order to not offend the line of Jewish carpenters outside its door.

"You did it to ME!"

Truth is...we maybe should be going beyond treating others as we would have them treat us, and instead, start treating others as we would want to treat Jesus.