First reading today: famous
passage from book of Maccabees: Mother and her seven sons are tortured; opponents
are trying to get them so give up their Jewish faith.
The Church has always seen in
them precursors to the early Christian martyrs, some two centuries before them.
We read: After him the third [son] suffered their cruel sport. He put out his
tongue at once when told to do so, and bravely held out his hands, as he spoke
these noble words: “It was from heaven that I received these; for the sake of his
laws I disdain them; from him I hope to receive them again.”
“It was from Heaven that I
received these; from him I hope to receive them again ”
At other times in the Church
Year, we get to hear what the mother of the seven brothers said to them. She
exhorted them in their own ancestral Hebrew tongue:
I do not know how you came to be in my womb; it was
not I who gave you breath and life, nor was it I who arranged the elements you
are made of.
We might be tempted to write
that off her remarks as mere ignorance, since she was speaking in 170 B.C.
"I don't know how you came to be in my
womb…"
Yes, in terms of general
biology and chromosomes and DNA, it is true that we know more about how her
sons came to be in her womb.
But even then, there are huge
mysteries of reproduction and gestation we still don’t fully understand,
And certainly when it comes
to the lines "it was not I who gave
you breath and life, nor was it I who arranged the elements you are made of…"
we modern people are no further along than her.
We can't explain the very
first question of philosophy which the German Heidegger says is "Why is
the anything and not just
nothing?" let alone can we answerer “Why is the life here and not just
minerals and chemicals?”
“Or what is life?” or “Where
does life come from?”
We have covered a lot of
ground since this poor mother spoke to her son, and yet there is still so much
we can't account for, let alone are we able to bring about in any way.
No. We recognize—or we should
recognize—like she said next in Maccabees: “since
it is the Creator of the universe who shaped the beginning of mankind and
brought about the origin of everything, he, in his mercy, will give you back
both breath and life…”
Why do I bring this up?
What's the point of this all?
It's because this realization—especially when every
once in awhile it hits us out of the blue—is a huge step to understanding life
and our faith.
We usually think that the
Christian Faith is about knowing a bunch of stuff about the Bible and Jesus.
And that’s part of it. But
the first thing a Christian needs to know is: "I am not a sufficient
explanation for myself.”
I cannot account for my own
being.
I am not the source of my
faculties, abilities, or talents.
There is no pulling myself up
by my own bootstraps.
Even if I trained myself into
an Olympic athlete or I built a business from scratch with just my bare
hands...
Where did those hands come
from?
Where did the sweat and
muscles I used?
Where the mind to create and
the will to work hard?
Whence came all the natural
talent I use?
Not from me.
No, I am a human.
I am radically dependent.
I was made from dust, and I
was given the breath of life and a
soul.
I was given a mind to
understand and a heart to choose.
Once I had
those things; yeah, I did a lot.
But all that I started with,
all the talents I applied, and all the desire to make something of myself—came
from outside.
I am a creature.
I am utterly dependent on a Creator.
We don't like to think of
that a lot. We're Americans. We're independent and self-starters.
Until we stop for a moment
and see that we're not.
Not at the root, at least.
You’re still wondering, what
is this about.
It's because Spider-Man is
right: with great power comes great…
And Jesus right before him:
to whom much is given much will be...
And we need to be reminded of
that—that we have been given much and
have great power—so we can have the right kind of grateful heart.
This week you will be
receiving your annual stewardship renewal card
Often when we hear
"stewardship" and we think first of Sunday monetary contributions.
Well, I don't care about your
Sunday contributions.
Ok well, I don't care about
your Sunday contributions that much.
What I care about is did you
hear and understand the stuff I've been saying the last 5 minutes?
Because if you do, if I do, then the rest takes care of
itself.
If I realize that I can't
account for my life and breath and days and years and abilities, then it's not
that hard to look at our yearly renewal cards and think about how awesome it is
to be alive.
To have breath and health,
and a mind and skills.
Then looking at this card and
thinking about how I can give my talents, that’s not a challenge at all.
Because we realize: those
talents aren’t mine—I was given them.
My time is not mine. I don’t
know how long I will have, and I don’t even know why I got this much to begin
with.
And I start to realize that
it’s not crazy to want to give back by maybe… signing up for a retreat, or
doing a holy hour.
Not crazy to think: My voice
isn’t bad. Maybe I should join a choir.
Look and think: You know,
somebody did right by me and was my CCD teacher and taught me the faith. Maybe
I can do that for someone else.
Those things become easy when
we remind ourselves that I am not my own cause of being.
That everything I am, and
everything I possess, and even my personal abilities, really doesn’t come from
me. Even with my talents, those didn’t start with me.
When I look at it that way,
this becomes an easy thing to fill out.
It actually becomes a bit of
a challenge to think: “Huh, what can’t I give? What can’t I return back to God?
What can’t I give to my parish?”
Becomes exciting to think how
lucky we are and ponder the great things we can do.
So this week when you get this,
look at this as a thank you card.
God is giving you the chance
to be truly thankful for the awesome opportunities you’ve been given in this
life.
That fact that you made it to
adulthood—think of how many people don’t do that—that’s an awesome gift.
The fact that you have a mind
to understand what I’m saying right now; the fact that you have talents that
apply in your daily life; those are huge.
When you think about those,
then you say: “I would love to fill out some of these things of time and talent
and treasure.”
You will receive you
Stewardship card…
Great quote from St.
Catherine of Siena!
(Same as past years, except
greeters and gift bearers combined.)
Go through
it—prayerfully—with your family—looking at to see if there is something new we
should do? Something to challenge ourselves with? Make a holy hour once a week?
Tear off your commitments.
Stick it with a magnet to your fridge!
Take the rest and bring it
next week and put it in the collection basket when we have our Stewardship
Renewal Sunday or you can drop it off at the parish office.
And then when we get it, we
divide it further. We remove the third panel with the financial stewardship
part and keep that confidential.
And then we pass the
remainder—the time and talents part—on to the committees that get ahold of
people and sign them up for activities.
And those people get excited.
They say, “I was always hoping that so-and-so would sign up to be a reader! I
wonder what happened?”
You know what probably
happened? They were sitting here on November 6, at 7:30 AM, trying to not think
of the blow-out we experienced last night, and they realized that the very fact
we have Huskers that are good enough to play Division 1 football, the very fact
that we have pews to sit in, the very fact we have backsides to sit on, that
all of those things are gifts from God—
—and at that moment it struck
you at 7:55 that you have awesome gifts, that you’ve been given so much, and
you realized “Yeah I want to give back”
I want to give my time and my
talent and my treasures back to the Lord.
I’m so thankful for what he
has given me, that he has entrusted to me in stewardship, that I just can’t
wait to give it back in stewardship to him.
