25th Sunday After Pentecost

Luke 18:18-27

In today’s holy gospel, a man comes up to our Lord and asks, ‘What must I do to inherit eternal life?’ This is an important question… And this must be the question for each of us… ‘What must we do to inherit eternal life?’

In answer to this question, our Lord reviews the commandments of God… Thou shalt not murder, thou shalt not steal, etc. Elsewhere in the Gospels Christ summarizes all the commandments as boiling down to ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart and with thy whole soul and with all thy strength and with all thy mind: and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.’

Brothers and sisters in Christ… what could be more simple and yet what could be more challenging than this? We must remember one thing and we must transform our lives according to this one thing: we must love God above all else and treat our neighbors with love. There is no higher calling than this and if we can fulfill it, if we can be guided by compassionate love in all things, then, with God’s help, all the other commandments, canons, and rules of conduct and piety fall naturally into place.

You don’t harm or insult or try to get the better of someone you love. You seek to console, protect, and see all good things in those whom you love. And remember… to love someone is not about how all this makes you feel, it is about how you behave. Love is a call of determination and sacrifice, not just a fluttering heart. We must step forward in love toward all those we meet by showing them love with our behavior – our courtesy, our kindness, our care. Loving feelings may or may not be present… let the feelings follow after the behavior, don’t wait for the feelings before you put love into action.

The young man in today’s Gospel declared that he kept all of the commandments. What else did he lack? Christ, the Great Physician, knew precisely the medicine needed for this particular soul and he told him that if he would be perfect, he should go and sell all that he possessed, give it to the poor, and follow Him.

This cut to the heart of the particular passion that weighed this man down: greed and love of possessions. And it was too much for him… the Gospel says he went away sorrowful for he had great possessions.

Let us ask ourselves… What particular passion of ours might Christ pinpoint if we were in this Gospel scene? Perhaps it is laziness, perhaps it is the love of comfort, perhaps it is sensual sins, or pride, or gossiping, or something else. Each and every one of us have one or more particular sins that anchor and weigh us down in our spiritual life. In addition to striving toward that love of God and neighbor, we need to identify, acknowledge, and work to root out our particular ‘anchors’ – those sins that might cause us to walk away sorrowful from the Lord’s invitation to follow Him.

We need to examine ourselves with scorching honesty and stop making excuses for our sins. We need to work to identify that particular stumbling block that causes us to fall into sin. We need to confess it, repent of it, and we need to ask God for His divine assistance in helping us to begin working our way past this problem that weighs us down and eclipses our vision of God and His love.

There is no sin which cannot be forgiven if we turn to God with a repentant heart. And there is no sin which is mightier than the strength and grace and will of God. Let us not deceive ourselves or let ourselves be deceived into thinking that our particular sins are insurmountable… this is a lie and if we allow ourselves to think this way it shows our lack of trust in God. Christ has trampled down death and all sin… it is now up to us to unite ourselves to Him and thereby unite ourselves to His victory over all evil.

Today’s Gospel is not a universal call for all of us to sell everything and move to the desert. Christ is calling you right from where you are. Maybe your challenge is to bring peace to a home that has gone foul with anger and irritation. If so, then this is the challenge before you… do it with love and realize that with God all things are possible. Maybe your challenge is to juggle the responsibilities of raising a family. If so, then do it with love and realize that with God all things are possible. Maybe your challenge is struggling to make ends meet in a land so far from home. Trust in God and recognize that, as the Gospel tells us, if you seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, then all things will be added unto you – things will be okay if we pray that God’s will be done and we are willing to surrender to that.

Whatever circumstance God has presented you with – this is your arena for battle with our tendency toward selfishness. We must take up our cross and call upon God to be with us in our daily lives..

May we continue to focus our attention on that most important of questions – what must we do to inherit eternal life. May we listen to and heed the Lord’s call as he reveals to us those sins that weigh us down like an anchor and prevent us from ascending in our hearts toward God. And may we have the simplicity of soul to trust in God as our spiritual physician – patiently enduring the struggles of our life in a spirit of humility and love. If we can do so, then we will begin to experience that Kingdom of Heaven even now as it permeates and shines within our soul and illumines all things around us! May God grant it!