The beginning of the today’s Gospel is interesting. It shares with us what Jesus is truly about. How often we expect Jesus to solve every problem in our life. Jesus came to turn men’s hearts from the things of this world to the realities of God. That which had been lost due to original sin.
A man comes to Jesus asking him to solve a squabble between himself and his brother, who was not sharing the owed inheritance. Jesus responds, not by giving a lesson on how to divide an inheritance, but by pointing him to the lawyers and authorities that take care of those things. Jesus is focused on the heart. This becomes a moment that Jesus jumps on to give a teaching on greed and what it means to be rich in the things of God.
Greed
It doesn’t matter if one is rich or poor. Greed is a reality every person deals with. It touches the heart of every fallen human person. On my very first mission trip to a third world country, I had brought with me suitcases full of things to give away. My suitcases were stuffed full of clothes, soccer balls, pumps, candy, games, rosaries, religious holy cards. A little bit of everything was in there. When I opened the suitcases, the people went crazy and just piled in, yelling, “give me, give me….” There was no thought of sharing. It was as if people had one opportunity to run through a store to grab everything they needed for a year. Obviously, this attitude comes from a place of need.
Greed is the inordinate love of the things of this world and in amassing great wealth. The important word being, inordinate. Material things are needed in this world. Even our spiritual life needs material things like books. Our sacraments in the Catholic Church have a material component to them: bread, wine, water, oil. Material things are needed for us to live according to our calling, to mitigate suffering, to grow the Kingdom of God, and for our own growth in holiness. Things are good.
Worth Gambling For
When Christ was hanging dying on the cross, the Roman soldiers were just below him on the ground gambling for his cloak. I cannot imagine that the soldiers, especially Romans, would gamble for something that was a little more than a rag. Christ’s cloak must have been nice and worth something. At least for the Romans it was worth gambling for, more than one person was looking to own it. Christ is losing his posh cloak, but it did not stop Him from completing his entrusted mission. He was not looking down on those soldiers and holding back from his salvific work because of a worry and anxiety about his cloak.
He knew what He was about, from where He came and where He was headed. His cloak served him well during the time he needed it. It was a gift He understood to be a gift. Jesus lived detached of what he owed and stripped of what He had, He died. “Father into your hands I entrust my spirit.”
Be rich in the things that matter to God. Our hearts were not made to be completely satisfied on this Earth. Jesus came to remind us of where our true allegiance should lie. The things of this world are a passing reality. If the Earth were meant to be paradise, Jesus himself would not have taken up his cross, showed us what true love is, given up everything, died dispossessed of everything but His obedience to his heavenly Father.
