The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today challenge us with the choice to choose a path that leads to full life in our relationships with God and others.
Choose the Path
The reading from the Book of Deuteronomy describes the choice before Israel.
* [30:14] In your mouth: that is, memorized and recited; cf. 6:7; 11:19. And in your heart: internalized and appropriated; cf. 6:6; 11:18.1
Psalm 1 lays out the Two Ways.
* [Psalm 1] A preface to the whole Book of Psalms, contrasting with striking similes the destiny of the good and the wicked. The Psalm views life as activity, as choosing either the good or the bad. Each “way” brings its inevitable consequences. The wise through their good actions will experience rootedness and life, and the wicked, rootlessness and death.2
In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus teaches about the conditions of discipleship.
* [9:23] Daily: this is a Lucan addition to a saying of Jesus, removing the saying from a context that envisioned the imminent suffering and death of the disciple of Jesus (as does the saying in Mk 8:34–35) to one that focuses on the demands of daily Christian existence.3
Suzanne Braddock comments that there are no concrete rules to follow, just give your whole self!
For me, losing my life for the Lord means shedding all those idols that, like barnacles, cling to me and weigh me down. Idols like desire for success, health, a long life, possessions, admiration of others. Both Moses and Jesus refer to giving our hearts to the Lord. When we truly love we in a sense lose our life. We are totally given over to the beloved. We live for the one we love. We cling to the Lord and not the idols hidden in our lives-those barnacles that weigh us down.4
Don Schwager quotes “God calls us to conversion,” by Augustine of Hippo, 354-430 AD.
"God calls us to correct ourselves and invites us to do penance. He calls us through the wonderful gifts of his creation, and he calls us by granting time for life. He calls us through the reader and through the preacher. He calls us with the innermost force of our thoughts. He calls us with the scourge of punishment, and he calls us with the mercy of his consolation." (excerpt from Commentary on Psalm 102, 16)5
The Word Among Us Meditation on Deuteronomy 30:15-20 comments that Moses tells us something else that is important: God will bless us every time we choose life. Moses promised the Israelites that this blessing would include a long life in the land that God had given them. But the blessings of life in Christ are far more expansive than that. They are the blessings of a closer relationship with him, the blessings of knowing his presence and hearing his voice more clearly. They are the blessings that St. Paul called the “fruit of the Spirit”—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, and faithfulness (Galatians 5:22).
Jesus knows that it can be hard to follow him. He knows that choosing his way sometimes means denying ourselves and taking up our cross (Luke 9:23). But he also knows that the blessings far outweigh the costs. And so as we begin our journey through Lent, he is asking us to count the cost and choose life. He is asking us to look at every situation as another opportunity to choose his way—and to know the blessings that such a choice will bring. So how do you want to live today? “Jesus, I believe that you want nothing more than to fill me with your love. Lord, help me to choose life today. Help me to choose you.”6
Friar Jude Winkler comments that the words of Moses point out that we may choose our own destruction. Jesus uses the Son of Man in Daniel 7 and the Suffering Servant in Second Isaiah to describe himself. Friar Jude reminds us of the theme of Lent that calls us to die to self to live in Christ.
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, introduces Joyce Rupp, who offers different metaphors for discovering the True Self. This is a journey that requires opening a door from within. The writings of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, René Hague, Paula D’Arcy and Beatrice Bruteau are cited about the nature of the True Self.
Our authentic self, which is in union with God, may seem out of reach. It never is. “Deep in ourselves is the true Self,” writes Beatrice Bruteau [1930–2014], “and that true Self is not separate from, or even different from, the Source of Being.” [3] Always our truest self cries out to be known, loved, embraced, welcomed without judgment and integrated into the way we live. When we open the door and go inside, God is there in the temple of our soul, in the ashram of our heart, in the cathedral of our being. Which is not to dismiss the reality of this same loving presence being fully alive in our external world. The Holy One is with us in all of life. Our purpose for opening the door inward is to help us know and claim who we are so we can more completely join with God in expressing this love in every part of our external world.7
Our decision to choose life initiates our journey to deeper experience of the fruits of the Spirit.
References
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