23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time
Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Wis 9: 13-18b; Phil 9-10, 12-17; Luke 14: 25-33
Dc. Larry Brockman
In one of his sermons St. Augustine of Hippo said this: “Consider that God wants to fill you up with honey, but if you are already full of vinegar where will you put the honey?” I think that this summarizes the essence of today’s Gospel.
You see, when we begin life, we are empty vessels. We are filled with neither honey nor vinegar. Life happens, and the experiences of life fill us with a combination of honey and vinegar. One of the experiences we have that fills our vessels the most is the influence of our families- mothers, dads, spouse and siblings. Let’s face it, nobody is perfect; so we inherit both honey and the vinegar from our families. When we first embrace our Faith, we embrace it with enthusiasm and resolve. But the facts are that most of us are vessels that are partially filled by that time. And the problem is this- the vinegar can block our way from the objective to follow Jesus, because we need a full vessel of honey to make the whole journey, it is either all or nothing with God. And so, we must dump the vinegar.
Now consider the people following after Jesus in this morning’s Gospel. We are talking about adults who have lived in their culture of the day and who have sour experiences and sweet experiences that have filled their vessels. And yet at this particular moment in their lives, they are brimming with enthusiasm about Jesus. They are following Jesus and hanging on every word. They want to follow after him on the road to the Kingdom of God that he promises them.
But Jesus shakes them all up with reality- the fact that their enthusiasm may not match their ability. Most scholars agree that the word “hate” here is not to be taken literally. That’s why I like the honey and vinegar concept. We cannot be totally dedicated to our families if we are to follow Jesus because some of the influence and commitment which members of our families require of us is the vinegar in our vessels. Which of us hasn’t heard the comment: “If you love me, you will….” That baggage may be filled with vinegar. And yet, if we follow Jesus, we can’t embrace the vinegar that our families demand of us.
I’m not talking about pain, but “vinegar”, or sin because all of us need to bear a certain amount of sacrificial pain on behalf of our families to show real love. But that is different than an expectation that we will support someone or do something for someone that is clearly wrong and keeps us from following Jesus.
The two parables today are interesting messages that support this argument. Take the tower for example. Unless we are committed to following Jesus, we will be like the guy who doesn’t have the resources to complete the tower. You see we might get most of the way there in building the tower before we realize we can’t complete the task Because our hearts are still tied to something of this world- a person, place, or thing- that we are just not willing to give up. Others, looking from the outside, might find this attachment, this impediment, laughable. But we may be blind to it, and frustrated by an inability to complete our task.
Likewise, the story about the king and the army resources can have a similar meaning. We might decide we aren’t able to go the whole 9 yards to follow Jesus because we don’t have courage to go all the way. That means the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. So what do we do? We try to bargain our way into a settlement. But sadly, we cannot bargain that way with God. What we end up doing is bargaining with the devil instead. We draw a line in the sand to hold on to something, and think we can still follow Jesus at the same time. Unfortunately, this Gospel is telling us it is either all or nothing with God.
And so, Jesus is telling the crowd to wake up to the reality of what committing to follow him is all about. It means we have to make a choice when we are confronted with a real test in life- a choice to give up whatever is necessary to follow Jesus.
Our second reading is a great example of the whole process of such a test. You see, Onesimus was a runaway “indentured” slave from Philomen’s household. Nowadays, we can’t relate to slavery; but it was ingrained in Roman society. Not only that, such property, as Onesimus was considered, was quite valuable. But the Christian teachings that Paul spread called for people to be converted in heart and set aside evil. Paul is asking Philomen to forgive the runaway slave, make no further claim to him, and accept him as a brother instead. Wow! What a choice.
Well, that’s the kind of choice each and every one of us will face at some point in our lives- maybe even more than once. We will be challenged to put aside the things of this world that hold us back, and make a choice to follow Jesus. What will you do?
