But Wait, There's More!

(28th Sunday in Ordinary Time, B)

After our break last week for the feast of St. Francis, we return to our reading in the gospel of St. Mark, and we have a real treasure today in this account of a man who seeks to know from Jesus how he can “inherit eternal life.”

The story is worth breaking down step by step. We first meet the man when he runs up to Jesus and kneels down before him. So right away we see the man in a posture of prayer, kneeling before the Lord, and no different from we ourselves when we come here before the Lord’s sanctuary and kneel before him in the Most Blessed Sacrament. We also note that the man ran. This prayer of his is urgent, and it’s one of the most basic prayers: “Good Teacher, what must I do?” We all know this prayer; I’ll bet that we have all prayed it. For the young who still have to decide what to do with their lives, the prayer has a particularly strong edge, ‘Lord, what should I do? What will be my vocation in this life?’ But the prayer is real for all of us; all the way through life we find ourselves in new situations, in new troubles and joys that push us to prayer, to the seeking of what God means for us to do. This is one of the basic prayers of every human heart: “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

The first answer Jesus gives is very plain: “You know the commandments,” he says. The way to salvation is no big secret; it isn’t specialized or arcane knowledge. The commandments are there for us to keep and inherit eternal life. So the man says, “all of these I have observed from my youth.” So what is this man’s problem? If he has kept all of the commandments from his youth, why is running up to the Teacher to ask what he is supposed to do? He seems to have already done what God asks!

Here we arrive at one of the spiritual truths that this gospel passage brings out. Has anyone here ever felt as if she or he wasn’t doing enough for God? You know, not praying enough, not thinking on God enough, not doing enough to live out our faith? I certainly feel that way all the time. I once read something by a retreat director who said that when people go on retreat, the first thing they do is start apologizing for not praying enough, not reflecting adequately on their Christian life, etc. Why do we feel that way? It’s simple: The Love of God is eternal and infinite. Our response to the Love of God, as limited creatures, is never going to live up to God, never going to be adequate to His infinity and eternity.

In fact, the holier we become in this life, the closer we come to the Mystery of God, the more inadequate our own prayer and devotion will feel. That’s why the saints saw themselves as the greatest of sinners. Because they were so close to God, the overwhelming brightness and goodness of God magnified their faults and sins. When people distance themselves from God, they stop caring about their sins. It’s only when we get close to God that we worry about them again.

So, if we ever felt as if our Christian lives or our prayer isn’t what it should be, congratulations! This is a sure sign of some closeness to God! And when we are ready to consent, the Love of God is always ready to invite us into the next step. Notice again one of the little details in the gospel: “Jesus, looking at him, loved him,” and that’s when Jesus invites the man to sell what he has, give to the poor, and to follow him.

When we consent to receive the Love of God, it’s not always ‘warm and fuzzy;’ God’s Love is very challenging! And as we heard, the man found that he wasn’t ready for the next step to which the Love of God invited him. He “went away sad” because of his many possessions. But notice also that it doesn’t say that the man didn’t do it! For all we know he may have regrouped spiritually in prayer, and fulfilled Jesus’ invitation later on. New moments in our spiritual life often seem overwhelming at first, but this is only to teach us to rely upon God’s help as we go forward.

So, as we make our Holy Communion today, may each of us run up to Jesus and kneel before him. Let us meet his loving gaze into our eyes and seek from him the next step into the goodness of God for each of us.