Seventeenth Sunday in Course 2023
I suppose those of us over the age of twenty had at least one experience of falling in love, and I mean with another human being. When I remember that time–over a period of about a month with my wife–certain emotions come to the surface. But truly BEING in love involved much more than an emotional high. It does need an emotional component, but, if it’s authentic, it demands engagement of the mind before decisions begin to be made. You have to see the other person and be attracted. You have to hear the voice and the thoughts that he or she articulates. And I think you have to have conversations and even arguments before you can allow yourself to commit to a loving relationship. But, most of all, you have to will and work toward the good of the other, the true and ultimate good. In marriage prep, we say that we have to become a principal means of the spouse getting to heaven and eternal happiness with God.
St. Paul, in this magnificent eighth chapter of his letter to the Church of Rome, has already told us that the Holy Spirit intercedes for us so that we can live according to God’s will. In today’s excerpt, he tells us what the Father’s response will be when we love Him. He knows and loves us, that being our predestination to ultimate union with Him. We are called forth from a world of sin to be images of Jesus Christ, and being called, we are also made just by His munificent grace. That justification leads, unless we stand in the way or refuse to pay the price of suffering, to eternal glory. Since we, therefore, must ultimately lose our natural life anyway, why not fall in love with God, commit ourselves entirely to Him, and attain by His grace and power the only thing that can make us happy–union with God?
Today we have a story from the OT historical books that helps us understand what in a man’s life can boost his love of God, and, by implication, what can hold it back. Solomon was a young king when he went to Gibeon to offer sacrifice and listen to God. He had just recently lost his dad, King David, who was intensely in love with God. In a vision, Solomon heard God ask him what he wanted. Solomon, in his juvenile enthusiasm, asked God for wisdom, to judge between what is right and what is evil. God liked that attitude, and gave him wisdom beyond anyone else on earth. But later we read that Solomon made some big blunders. To cement his rule and as it were buy the loyalty of subject kings and peace with his neighbors, he took what we in the South would call “a whole mess of wives.” Each came with a national god to worship, and practices that did not jibe with the Law of YHWH. Solomon fell into the trap, and as he got older, his passions messed with his mind and his wisdom eroded. Just because we fall in love with God doesn’t mean we will stay deeply in love with God. We mustn’t let our passions, our lusts for power, glory or pleasure stand in the way of that divine love.
So when you find the treasure, the love of God, sell out your passions before they sell out your love. When you locate the pearl beyond dollars in value–and what isn’t these days?–don’t just sell everything to get Him, to get Jesus, protect that pearl and treasure it beyond any other joy. Always discern the good and the bad. Listen to wise folks in the Church, but don’t assume that just because someone claims to be a follower of Jesus, everything he says is true. Always submit every prophecy to discernment. Does the idea fit within the two-thousand year, unbroken line of truth found in Scripture and confirmed in Tradition? Then it’s ok. If it’s something that conflicts with that teaching, pull it out of your net and throw it in the fire.
