PROPERS: PROPER
25, YEAR A
TEXT: MATTHEW 22:34-46
PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S,
MAGNOLIA SPRINGS, ON SUNDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2017.
ONE SENTENCE: The ideal is for the Summary of the Law to be the primary
motivation we have in life.
A primary way I have of
understanding situations is metaphor. That it is to say that I describe something
complex as like something less
complex or more descriptive.
I love metaphors and use them a lot.
I had the insight of an important
metaphor this week. It has to do with football. But, first, some context.
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Many years ago, I was a college
football fanatic. I was a rabid Ole Miss
fan. I went to my first Ole Miss game at
age seven and came to maturity in the era of Archie Manning. I knew the ins and outs of football
statistics and to this day I can repeat facts about games of those years.
Nora will tell you that I was not
easy to be around. She was a very good
sport about it, though, arriving with me at football games even before the stadium opened.
When Ole Miss lost – which was very frequent during my college and early
adult years – my weekend was ruined. I
would be in a dark mood for days.
Something had to give.
Some years later, it was with a
great deal of amusement to many people when I was called to be rector of Church
of the Resurrection, Starkville – home of Mississippi State University, the
archrival of Ole Miss. The president of
the University was a member of the parish. He even gave me a maroon blazer at my
installation. He invited Nora and me to sit in the president’s box for the Ole Miss-State
game that year.
Friends laughed at me, and ribbed me
good naturedly. How do you do it, they asked?
I had a standard answer. It was from St. Paul’s First Letter to the
Corinthians: “I have become all things to
all people that some might be saved.”
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Actually, it was me who had been
saved.
I have said over the years that part
of my spiritual maturity was being healed of football. It happened during the years between my
obsession with Ole Miss football and my arrival in Starkville.
It was part of my call to the
ordained ministry. It was the grace of
God, pure and simple. And while we might
chuckle about it today, it was an incredible development in my life. It was
a metaphor for God’s movement in my soul. I had been freed from an unhealthy
compulsion.
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Jesus is being challenged by the
Pharisees in today’s gospel. They are
doing their best to trap him in his words. They ask him: Which commandment in the Law is the greatest?
His response is what we call the Summary of the Law: “’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. And a second is like it:
‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all
the law and the prophets.”
That
seems so easy – so straightforward. If that is all we have to do, we’re okay.
As
I mentioned last week, Jesus’ responses to questions are never easy. As I said, they complexify the situation. If
you dig into his response, you find there is much more to be done.
How do we love God with all our heart, soul,
and mind?
How do we love
our neighbor as ourselves?
Those
are tall orders.
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It
was that call… that approach to life… which drew me from the pit of my own
obsession during the early chapters of my own spiritual journey. Jesus and his teaching became the North Star which I could rely on during
the dead reckoning of life. It was a
different style of life with a different focus.
Other things faded into the background.
But,
as we all know, we live life imperfectly.
None of us – certainly not me – lives a life completely in sync with
Jesus’ teachings.
However,
we can grasp hold of it as our own – as the central tenet in a life of complex
decisions. And like a hand-held compass,
it can draw us back to the direction we hope to travel.
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So,
it was this week, as I attended a YMCA Gridiron dinner. The speaker was Eli Gold, “the voice of the
Crimson Tide.” He was hosted at the
event by our daughter, Leigh.
There
was a fabulous silent auction for college football memorabilia – including some
of the most amazing items I have ever seen.
There were autographed memorabilia from many SEC football greats – many
going back to my salad days. I was taken back to days of yore and to the old passions which stirred my soul.
It was like
a trip down memory lane.
The next
day I reflected. I thought of those
re-stirred passions. My rekindled love of college football – rising during this
season – and the old animosities toward specific schools came back to me.
I was
uncomfortable.
Questions
challenged me. What really matters? What
makes a difference? What is important to
me? What
is the motivating force in my life?
This may
seem trivial. College football may not
be an issue for you. But for me, it is a
metaphor. It is a symbol for idolatry. It is a sign of my life being out of balance.
I asked myself: What is the focus of my
life? Where do I place ultimate value?
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Jesus tells
us today.
“’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. And a second is like
it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang
all the law and the prophets.”
That
approach does simplify our spiritual journey.
But it also complicates it.
The love
for God and for our fellow human beings is to be our guiding light… our
animating force… the focus of our lives.
Sure, we
will fall short… we will lose our vision for our goal. We are, after all, human. We are afflicted
with the human condition. Perfection is
not an option.
Our
challenge, though, is to recognize when we have lost our focus – and
return. Return to our source of life and
the source of meaning.
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