Being Stewards of Mystery
by Fr. David M. Knight
Sunday, October 13, 2024
Twenty-Eighth Sunday of the Year
Lectionary 143
Wis 7:7-11/Heb 4:12-13/Mk 10:17-30
What do you consider the most important thing in life? Are your reason and your faith united in this? Does your lifestyle make your values evident to others? Are you a “faithful steward” of the truth entrusted to you?
Today’s celebration is directed by the desire for wisdom — which is defined both as the “taste” and appreciation for spiritual things (“wisdom” in Latin is sapientia, which has the same root as “savor”) and also as the habit of seeing everything on earth in the light of life’s final end. It is wisdom that keeps us moving toward the “more” of Christian perfection.
The Spirit of Wisdom
The Responsorial asks: “Fill us with your love, O Lord, and we will sing for joy!” But this is a realistic request. We ask God first, “Make us know the shortness of our life, that we may gain wisdom of heart.” To appreciate God as All it helps to realize that everything else is nothing without him.
In Wisdom 7: 7-11 the author prays for wisdom. He doesn’t take it for granted. But he “esteems her more” than “scepters and thrones” (power), riches, health and beauty. This means wisdom was already given to him! And his wisdom was already confirmed by experience: “In her company all good things came to me.”
Have we had this experience? We know, because Jesus has taught us, that we should love, desire and seek God above all things — “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment.” But how much practical effect does this “treasure of wisdom and knowledge” have on our lives?
Have we, like the “wicked and lazy servant” Jesus talks about, “gone off and dug a hole in the ground and hid the master’s money” — that is, this teaching of Jesus — where it would do no one any good?
Jesus taught us plainly:
Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink? Or wear?’ But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
Have we taken his words seriously?
He has told us what to work for in life:
Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For it is on him that God the Father has set his seal.
Is this a teaching we have buried somewhere in some unvisited place in our memory?
Jesus taught us through Paul a basic principle of happiness: that the most important thing in life is to be loving: “Strive for the greater gifts.… Pursue love….” Is this our first thought in the morning and our constant goal throughout the day?
God has invested his own divine life in us. Do we live to give him the fruits of it? This is what it means to be faithful “stewards of the manifold grace of God.”
So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. (See Matthew 22: 28-29; 6: 31-33; John 6:27; 1Corinthians 12:31 to 14:1; Colossians 3:1; 1Peter: 4:10.)
“Fill us with your love, O Lord, and we will sing for joy!”
Sell everything
Suppose you were a stockbroker. One of your clients, whose account you manage, calls you and says, “Sell everything! Invest all I have in…” (some single stock). As the “steward” of the client’s money, would you do as asked?
In Mark 10: 17-30 Jesus tells us to do exactly this. A “man of great wealth” asked him what to invest in to receive “eternal life,” life to the full. Jesus told him, “Sell everything you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven” — treasure beyond your wildest dreams — “then come, follow me.”
Like the man in the story, we have “great wealth” — but it isn’t ours! Everything we have comes from God, belongs to God, and is entrusted to our management to be used for God’s purposes. When Jesus says, “Sell,” then as faithful stewards of what is his, we have to sell! But what does this mean?
John Paul II has given a penetrating interpretation to this story:
This vocation to perfect love is not restricted to a small group of individuals. The invitation, ”Go, sell your possessions and give the money to the poor,” and the promise “You will have treasure in heaven” are meant for everyone, because they bring out the full meaning of the commandment of love for neighbor. (See his letter The Splendor of Truth (1993, nos. 18-20).)
Saint Pope John Paul’s genius was to see that Jesus is giving a key to our observance of all the commandments that deal with love of neighbor. The key is that nothing on this earth (and Jesus uses possessions as an example here) should be more important to us than our relationship of love with others. To “sell all you possess and give it to the poor” means that we should put all we have and are at the service of others: our time, our energies, our possessions, our talents, “all we possess.” We don’t defend any of these in the slightest way against the demands of others. Henceforth our use of anything we have will be determined only by what is most beneficial to others or more according to what we discern as God’s will for us. This is perfect stewardship. It is total abandonment of all we have and are to the work of building up the body of Christ in love.
The gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ. (Ephesians 4:11-13.)
“Fill us with your love, O Lord, and we will sing for joy!”
Principles of Accounting
In Hebrews 4: 12-13 St. Paul reminds us that we must “render an account” to God for our stewardship. But he also tells us where to look for the principles of accounting we should use: we go to the “word of God.)
St. Paul gave us an example of this:
Think of us in this way, as servants of Christ and stewards of God’s mysteries. Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy. But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. I do not even judge myself. (1Corinthians 4:1-3.)
In the Scriptures, which are “able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart,” we find that we will be judged by the law of love: “Fill us with your love, O Lord, and we will sing for joy!”
Insight: How much conscious influence does Christ’s teaching have on your life?
Initiative: Develop the habit (wisdom) of asking in every decision, “What is my goal?”
Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry
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