How important is Jesus to you? I mean, how do you show it and not just say it?
It is common enough to admit, confess or worry about how we don’t make God enough of a priority in our lives. It’s common enough in my life. Not giving God enough time in prayer or adoration, cheating God a bit by not giving him the whole of my heart and mind — that’s just as much part of my confession as yours. It’s just the way it is, I guess. Merely finite creatures trying to love an eternal God, we’re bound to blink, bound to tire, to falter. It is what it is. Sometimes we just don’t give God what he deserves — our everything.
Which is why the saints astound us. St. Francis stripping naked, giving up everything; St. Anthony the Great hearing the Gospel just that one time and then vanishing into the desert for 20 years; missionaries, nuns and monks giving it all up to serve the Church: all of it is amazing, and at once, it inspires and intimidates us. It’s beautiful to see that saints do radical saintly things. But why can’t I do that? Why can’t I give God everything? What’s holding me back?
They are questions like these that I wrestle with whenever I come across parables like some of those we hear this Sunday. Jesus says the kingdom is like a merchant searching for pearls, who when he finds the most beautiful pearl he’s ever seen, “goes and sells all that he has and buys it.” He gives up everything for the kingdom; that’s the point. But that’s also exactly what I have trouble doing, tied down by the worries of the world and my own disordered priorities. Do you see what I mean? Do you see why parables like this make me uncomfortable?
| July 30 – 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time |
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1 Kgs 3:5, 7-12 Ps 119:57, 72, 76-77, 127-128, 129-130 Rom 8:28-30 Mt 13:44-52 |
And the next parable only makes me more nervous, the one about the “net thrown into the sea, which collects fish of every kind.” The good fish are kept; the bad fish are thrown away. But what sort of fish am I? If I haven’t given everything up for the kingdom like a St. Francis or Mother Teresa, then what hope do I have of being counted among the good fish? Again, you see what I mean?
Jesus is trying to tell the people right in front of him that the kingdom is at hand, and that they need to take this seriously, that they need to realize this is the most important thing in their lives, that they need to drop everything and change everything because of it. But how did people hearing all this respond? Well, the results were mixed: a few followed, others hated him for it and plotted his destruction while most just probably walked on by because they were either too busy or had better things to do. That’s the way the kingdom of God is announced, as something you can either accept or reject. It all just depends on what you make of it — whether you see it for what it really is, whether you think it’s important enough for you to change your life for the sake of it.
Which I suspect is the challenge of these particular parables. We say God is important, that he matters, but does he really? Have I given everything? Has my life changed at all because of my faith in God, or is my Catholicism really just a bunch of words or family heritage or mere feelings? The invitation these parables offer is the invitation to take faith seriously. Which is to allow our faith to change us, to give up what’s not of Christ. Because Christ is more important than everything, especially whatever’s keeping you from following him fully.
