One of the most memorable birthday parties we threw for our son was when he turned six. It involved 10 yard waste bags and the monkey brains (aka Osage oranges) that had fallen from the Osage orange tree on the parkway. We lined up the bags and announced a contest to see who could fill up his bag with the most monkey brains. The clear winner: my husband who could now give the lawn its final mow of the season.

Imagine my chagrin, when I read this headline of a recent New York Times story: “It’s a Toddler’s Party. How About a $75,000 Budget?”

My chagrin increased as the article described six-year-old William’s birthday party. One hundred people (oh, just think of all those monkey brains and yard waste bags) RSVP’d for the party, which was held at a Los Angeles park on a March afternoon. By 12:30 p.m., the fire station-themed event was in full swing when the actual firetruck and firefighters arrived. Energetic attendees donned fire-hose backpacks and gleefully coasted down slides into a large custom ball pit, detailed with flames and the slogan, "Let’s Get Fired Up!”

“Preparation for the event had begun three months before when planners began working with the birthday boy’s mother and 14 vendors to hammer out details.” The article said.

The party included a 20-foot-wide wooden backdrop, more than 40 feet of balloon garlands, a food truck and canvas umbrellas shading a long wooden table. Oh, FYI, this party was scaled back from last year’s. The parties don't just celebrate a child's birthday, but they also provide fodder for parents' social media, with people trying to one-up each other on how big their child's party could get.

An LA party planner noted that kids’ parties for the “uber-wealthy” can cost as much as $75,000 but reassures that other parents who hire planners only spend between $10,000 and $40,000.

Well, that’s a relief.

All of this sure beats a stable for a birthday venue—or does it?

Philippians 2:6-7 describes the preparation that went into that stable birthday: “who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of servant, being born in the likeness of man.”

What was our birthday boy thinking—not grasping what was rightfully his? People didn't even notice, only animals, shepherds and, oh yeah, a sky filled with angels.

I wonder if those LA moms would have let even one balloon slip from their grasp as they posted the birthday party of their dreams on Instagram. How they excitedly post images and videos for the praise of other wealthy people. And it’s not just moms out there in La La Land who grasp and clutch at treasures and the oohs and aahs of others admiring the lengths they'll go to throw parties for the ones they love.

We obviously aren't planning a $75,000 party anytime soon (sorry), but I can get a bit selective about my guest list. I feel hurt or slighted by an offhand remark or I'm shocked that a person would do that to me. Well, delete those names off my guest list. Some days I grasp my right for self-care. I need to do this for me so I can’t come to your party. Thanks, but no thanks. I want to be right, get in the last word, the last post, the best Instagram, the witty comment. These things are as far as they can be from our Savior or the way he has for us.

In contrast, Scriptures tell us what Jesus was thinking when he came down, down, down to earth, and “being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross."

Dying to forgive is a far cry from dying for people to see the firetrucks and chefs and firehouse backpacks. And inviting the lost and misfit to the party makes it far more wonderful than any curated guest list party planners in Beverly Hills handle, or the more meager ones I clutch in my Midwest hands.