Sunday, October 11, 2015

Wishes & Wisdom

Heinrich Hofmann, Christ and the Rich Young Ruler (1889)

If you could have any wish in the world granted, what would it be? Would you go for the obvious – like a million bucks or a trip around the world – or would you be more shrewd in what you wished for? I remember an old joke: a man rubs a lamp and a genie comes out. The genie says, “You have one wish – but choose carefully.” The man thinks and says, “I want all the women of the world to find me irresistible.” The genie shakes his head, and turns the man into a bar of chocolate.

In the first reading, we hear about a man much wiser than that amorous fellow. The Book of Wisdom is traditionally attributed to have been written by Solomon, the third king of Israel and the son of David. God was pleased with Solomon for completing the first Temple in Jerusalem, and so he tells Solomon, “Ask for anything and I will give it to you.” Solomon had inherited a vast and powerful kingdom from his father, but he also knew that he was young and inexperienced. So instead of asking for riches, or security, or a long life, he asks instead for wisdom – what the Psalm for today calls “wisdom of the heart.” Solomon valued wisdom above all because he knew that wealth and power and beauty and fame all eventually fade, and unless we have learned wisdom, we ultimately have gained nothing.

The Bible speaks often of wisdom, especially in the Old Testament. Wisdom is more than knowledge or insight – it is a divine quality, the ability to see as God sees, to understand as God understands. For the Jewish people, divine wisdom existed before the world was created, and it was the means by which God created the world – the agent through which he revealed himself in his creation. The Jews often personified wisdom as a beautiful woman – as Solomon writes in the first reading, “I preferred her to scepter and throne, and deemed riches nothing in comparison with her.” To have wisdom was, in a sense, to have reached perfection – to be as close to God as any human could be.

In the Gospel, we hear the familiar story of the rich young man who also desires perfection. And he is very close – as he says, he has followed the basic principles of a good life, the Ten Commandments, since his youth. But he is spurred on by a desire for something more, and who does he turn to? He runs up to Jesus, he throws himself on his knees, and asks “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” He recognizes that Jesus possesses something that he can’t find elsewhere. And Jesus looks at him with love, and then tells him to go and sell all he has, give it to the poor, and follow him.

How hard those words must have been to hear! The man, as we hear, goes away sad. There is no doubt that for any of us to follow Jesus means giving something up, to let go of something that we are clinging to instead of letting go in order to follow him freely. But exactly what that something is is different for each of us. Did you notice how the young man phrased his question to Jesus, “What more must I do to inherit eternal life?” He is a rich young man, but even the way he phrases this desire for perfection – an internal desire – has overtures of wealth and riches.

The rich young man is called to true holiness by giving away his riches. But it’s not the riches themselves that are the problem – it’s his attachment to them. Jesus calls each of us to give up exactly what holds us back from following him. For some of us that might be wealth – so we are called to give to the poor and the needy. For others of us, it is lust or impurity of heart – so we are called to control our passions and discipline our desires. For others of us, it might be anger (and so we practice patience) or pride (and so we strive for humility) or love of excess (and so we try to live simply) or sloth (and so we pray for vigor and fervor of spirit). I’m sure that each of us know, deep down, right now, what we are being asked to give up in order to follow Jesus more closely.

Perhaps though we might ask, “Well that’s hard! What exactly am I getting in return for giving all of this up?” That’s exactly what the disciples ask Jesus in the Gospel. A minute ago I said that for the ancient Jews, wisdom was often personified as Lady Wisdom – the handmaid of God by which he reveals himself. But for us as Christians, we go a step further – wisdom is not personified but a Person, Jesus. He is the revelation of God, the one in whom and through whom he has created all things. He is Wisdom Incarnate. To be his follower means to give something up, yes – but it also means to gain something far more valuable than gold or silver, than long life or good health. By following Jesus, we gain wisdom from the living Word of God himself.

You know, there’s another story in our Christian tradition about a man being offered anything he wanted. St. Thomas Aquinas, our patron saint, was a brilliant theologian. After he had finished his great treatise on the Eucharist, on what happens at every Mass in the transformation of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ, he took a moment to pray. While praying before a crucifix, he had a vision, and Jesus spoke to him, “You have written well of me, Thomas. What reward would you have?” Imagine the possibilities that would have attracted a man of Thomas’s intellect – to understand the secrets of the natural world and of history, to contemplate with clear vision the mysteries of the universe. But Thomas recognized the chance to have true wisdom – and so to this question “What reward would you have,” he responded, “Non nisi te, Domine” – “Nothing, but you, Lord.”

My friends, amid all of the cares and concerns of our daily lives, we should be like Solomon and understand that we really need is wisdom. Don’t strive for riches, or for power, or for fame, or for pleasure, or for happiness as the world knows it; don’t strive for a carefree existence, or for honor, or for knowledge. None of those things bring true happiness. Rather, seek true wisdom – let go of what you are grasping on to so that you can follow Jesus. Be like him – if you seek to possess, give away; if you seek to be happy, learn to embrace suffering; if you seek to be great, be humble and serve others. Jesus can give to each of us a perfection that surpasses every desire, but only if we focus ourselves on him alone.

So if you could be given any wish, what would it be? Make the way you live the answer: “Nothing, but you, Lord.”

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