Pick your Battles.....

Many years ago, my dad taught me a lesson that I am still learning today.   He said: "Son, sometimes you have to choose your battles."  He meant that you need to examine every situation to see if what you are about to argue about or correct someone about is worth the effort, and more importantly, the repercussions. Do you want to argue this point if it costs you a friendship?  Is what you are being upset about worth it?  As a father and step-father this advice is something I need to listen to more often.  St. Paul says in the first reading today, "Remind people of these things and charge them before God to stop disputing about words. This serves no useful purpose since it harms those who listen."  Oh how many spouses need this today, myself included?  Arguing in front of the kids instead of supporting one another is one of the worst things we can do, but doesn't it happen?  Too often I am sure.  How much more so inside our own faiths?  There wouldn't be a Protestant version of Christianity at all if this line of reasoning had been followed and things had been handled differently.

Jesus reminds us time and again that arguing among ourselves just creates division. A house divided cannot stand.  One of the greatest charges against Christians these days is "If that's how Christians act, I don't want to be one."  The other day I was walking down Washington Street here in our little town.  Two men were yelling at each other, one up on a balcony, the other on the ground.   Angry words were being exchanged riddled with vulgarity and threats.  At one point the man on the balcony yelled, "Yeah you're being real Christian aren't you."  Turns out the guy down on the ground was a minister of some sort.  Would anyone have known that by his behavior?  How often do I set that own example?  Too often I myself would be the guy on the ground, angry with the man shouting down at me, likely responding in kind.

There are though some things which are worth standing up for.   Paul, in our readings today,  also reminds us that we must "be eager to present yourself as acceptable to God, a workman who causes no disgrace, imparting the word of truth without deviation."  We cannot change the truth, we cannot alter the Gospel to go with the times or with our desires.  It is a message that does not belong to us, but rather belongs to God.   We have no right to change it and Paul is quick to say that even if an angel were to come and give you a different Gospel we should not believe it.   How then do we go about walking that line of choosing our battles but always offering the truth?  By offering the truth in love.  "They will know we are Christians by our love."  Does society see that today? Do they find us loving and welcoming? Or hateful and condemning?  We have to choose our battles for sure.  Sometimes the fight will produce no love.  Sometimes the person is not open to it, and we should leave it be.  No use "throwing pearls before swine", right? But in all things, show love.

Jesus reminds us of that in the Gospel for today.  That the greatest commandments are to love God with everything that you are, and to love your neighbor as you love yourself.   That is to want good for them, to offer good to them, to pray for good for them.  Loving someone does not always mean condoning their behavior or giving them anything and everything they want.   It does mean though being tactful.   Seeking to find the best way to reach them with an offer to know who Christ is.   Sometimes that means using our words, and other times it means using our actions.   I know, this is a perfect time to use that cliche saying attributed to Saint Francis of Assisi.. and I am going to.  "Preach at all times the Gospel, and when necessary, use words."   Just don't forget that Saint Francis used a lot of words!

2518 The sixth beatitude proclaims, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." "Pure in heart" refers to those who have attuned their intellects and wills to the demands of God's holiness, chiefly in three areas: charity; chastity or sexual rectitude; love of truth and orthodoxy of faith. There is a connection between purity of heart, of body, and of faith: The faithful must believe the articles of the Creed "so that by believing they may obey God, by obeying may live well, by living well may purify their hearts, and with pure hearts may understand what they believe."

The other thing that I think is so important about the encounter between Jesus and the Pharisee in the Gospel for today is that Jesus tells him "You are not far from the Kingdom of God."   I wonder if those men years later realized the irony of that statement.  There this man was speaking to God himself, face to face with Jesus who is the embodiment of the Kingdom of God, and his eyes were closed.  Love itself sat looking at Him and said to Him, "I am right here before you."  Then like most of us, they were scared to ask anymore questions.  How often we become dumbfounded when we realize something profound is happening in front of us.   What would you do if God were to stand before you right now, at this very moment and say "Here I am.  You are so close to being a part of my Kingdom.. just come forward and receive it."

2519 The "pure in heart" are promised that they will see God face to face and be like him. Purity of heart is the precondition of the vision of God. Even now it enables us to see according to God, to accept others as "neighbors"; it lets us perceive the human body - ours and our neighbor's - as a temple of the Holy Spirit, a manifestation of divine beauty.

It happens every day at Mass.  Christ comes down body and soul before you on the altar.  The ministers come forth and elevate this defenseless host before you, and declare "This is the body of Christ."  There it is, the Kingdom of God.. right in front of you... heaven kissing earth.   Christ offering himself to you, the fullness of love, to help you grow and become the person you are called to be.  Do we like the Pharisee of the moment sit in silence unable to ask more?  Or do we say "Here I am Lord, speak, Your servant is listening."?

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."

Sitting on a fence is a man who sees no sense at all

Tomorrow’s Gospel reading finds the people once again questioning Jesus and doubting in him.  They accuse him of being allied with Beelzebub, the chief of demons, the entity we know as Satan himself.  Then others were testing him asking for more miracles, more signs.  The thing is the signs were an extra, an addition to Jesus mission, but the primary goal was to evangelize.  He came to spread the Good News the Kingdom of God was among them, it was right there, right now.  Jesus then goes on to tell them that a Kingdom cannot stand divided, it will always fall.   How could he then be performing these miracles from Satan?  These were miracles of healing, miracles of the light, miracles that brought people closer to God.. that brought them to the Message, not away from it.  

Jesus evokes to the mind of those present two amazing images.  He compares his miracles to the miracles of the exorcists of the current Jewish clergy.  This brings back the image of Pharaoh and his magicians fighting against Moses.  

Luke and Matthew both have these Jewish images of Jesus that portray him as the New Moses, sent to lead Adonai’s people from slavery to the promised land in an Exodus par excellance.  Here Jesus infers that the people questioning him, the ones testing him, are like Pharaoh and his magicians, standing in the way of God’s plans.  

He challenges them to make a choice… there is no middle ground.. no third option.. either you believe that I am from the devil or that I wield the power of the finger of God.   

That bring’s another image to their minds.  The finger of God… the very thing which wrote the law, the tablet of stone.  What kind of man then would he be if he were doing this with that sort of power?  He challenges their Jewish sensibilities.   He says, look it’s impossible for me to be from Satan, Satan couldn’t perform these miracles without undermining his own goal.  Therefore I am wielding the finger of God.. I am writing the new covenant right before you, are you willing to let me write on your heart of stone? For some this message stuck, as we see with the Apostles, with the woman at the well, with good old Bartimaeus.   They accepted this teaching, this authority, and as such experienced a metanoia so powerful that they left behind their old lives and followed him, even unto death.  For others, like the young rich man, it left them sad and walking away.   We don’t know that he didn’t accept it, but we do know that he knew the message.

There is a book that I purchased many years ago in my search for the true Church.  It is called A Rabbi Talks with Jesus by Jacob Neusner.   In this book he imagines what it would be like to be one of these first century Jews confronted with the message of Christ.   He puts himself in several of the scenes where Christ taught his torah and asked himself, what would it mean to me?  What would my response be?  What is it that Christ is offering in his teaching?  In the end the Rabbi walks away from Christ, not accepting him as a savior.  One thing is clear though, there is no doubt in Jacob’s mind that Jesus is not just offering a new teaching but claiming divinity!  Claiming the power to write with the hand of God.  Claiming to be God.

That puts us in the same shoes as those gathered around Jesus in the Gospel, right here, right now.  The Gospel doesn’t just record an event from the first century, but presents the same event to every person of every time.  Jesus is standing before us today, two thousand years later, and saying “Who do you say that I am?”  He is offering to write on your heart of stone with the finger of God itself.   To take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.   That’s the Gospel, it challenges us to have an encounter, a relationship with God.  He wants to arm us with faith, and with an ally so strong that he can never be overcome.

In the scripture we are shown that Jesus has overcome Satan, he wields a divine authority, a beatific power that cannot be overcome.  Jesus speaks later in a parable where he says “When a strong man fully armed guards his palace, his possessions are safe. But when one stronger than he attacks and overcomes him, he takes away the armor on which he relied and distributes the spoils.”  God has offered you the greatest spiritual military available and strength beyond human limits.   He has offered to fight for you, to guard your palace, and your soul will always be safe.”  All you have to do is be obedient, to listen to his Son and follow Him through the teachings he has handed on through his Apostles.  If our Armor is not Christ himself, then we will be overcome.  That’s what happens when we try to do it on our own isn’t it?  Those little sins that we keep falling into it.. when we think “I have this beat!” that’s the moment when it rears it’s ugly head.  However, when we fall on our knees and say “God I can’t do this on my own.. help me!”  That’s a moment of conversion.  A moment when we give ourselves to that defender who cannot be beaten, the King of the Universe himself.

It’s interesting when we look back to those who were given that offer at the very beginning of the salvation history they responded heartily “All that the Lord has spoken we will do.” (Exodus 19:8)  Then we see in Jeremiah the Prophet reminding us how often we humans fail to do what we have promised.  

But they obeyed not, nor did they pay heed. They walked in the hardness of their evil hearts and turned their backs, not their faces, to me. From the day that your fathers left the land of Egypt even to this day, I have sent you untiringly all my servants the prophets. Yet they have not obeyed me nor paid heed; they have stiffened their necks and done worse than their fathers. When you speak all these words to them, they will not listen to you either; when you call to them, they will not answer you. Say to them: This is the nation that does not listen to the voice of the LORD, its God,or take correction. Faithfulness has disappeared; the word itself is banished from their speech.

They failed.  They failed because they eventually began to count on themselves.  They stopped trusting in God, they stopped listening to him and turned back to their own ego, their own means to try and provide for their own spiritual defense.  They were human.  God was faithful to them though.  He’s faithful to you.  He is merciful and forgiving (Dan 9:9). He has given us the fullness of revelation in Jesus Christ.  Jesus gave us the Church and her Sacraments to say to us: “When you fall, when you forget me, come back to me.. I am waiting.  I am your Father and you are my prodigal child!  When I see you coming to me in the distance, I will run to meet you in your filthiness, in your fallen state, and I will clean you up.. I will wrap my arms around you, clothe you in my robe!  Put my ring of authority on your finger!  Then invite you into my banquet.”  That’s what confession is!  That’s what the Sacrament of Reconciliation is all about… it’s about God reaching out to you to take care of you.. to change you.. to bring you into his feast, his banquet, to re-armor the inner chamber of your heart, that you can say again “All that you have said, I shall do.”

Let’s not waste the next few weeks of Lent.   As we draw closer to Holy Week, as we draw closer to the Via Dolorosa, let’s draw closer to Christ.  Let’s increase our prayer life, our fasting, and our almsgiving! Let’s put on the armor of God, and produce the fruit of the Holy Spirit in such abundance that no one will doubt whose side we are on.  God isn’t offering a middle ground. "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters." Are you ready to choose?  Does your life say that you have sided with Jesus?  Is your heart made of flesh or are you clinging to remnants of stone?  Are you trusting in God to armor you?  Or burying your head in the sand and trying to do it on your own? Are you ready to stop sitting on the fence and climb over into the promised land?

His servant and yours,

Brian

“He must increase, I must decrease.”