Let’s review what we’ve heard these past few weeks. Let’s review what Jesus said.

He said, “beware of all covetousness; for a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions…Fool! This night your soul is required…”[1] He also said, “do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat, nor about your body…”[2] Today he says, “Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes…”[3]

But how are we to understand what we’ve heard? I keep thinking about what Jesus said a little earlier in Luke.  “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!” he said.[4] Blessed are those who hear it and keep it. That’s important for our understanding what Jesus has said to us: blessed are those who hear it and keep it.

The question is about the quality of our hearing the word of God. Have we really heard it? Has that hearing changed us? Have we kept the word of God?

Because the word of God should change us. Why? Because it’s the word of God. Because it’s powerful. Because it’s actually God himself. Because it’s the voice of creation; it spoke light into existence. Because our pathetic resistance should be no match for it.

But it is. The word of God often doesn’t change us. Why? St. Bernard of Clairvaux said, “the difficulty is rather in stopping our ears.”[5] The Scripture talks about “hardness of heart.” Pharaoh suffered from it.[6] Jesus talked about it.[7] So did Paul.[8] Sklerokardia is the Greek word for it; it’s where we get the word “sclerosis.”

But I also think that it’s because although we’re often okay with changing our opinions—often too okay with it!—we’re not okay with changing our lives. You see this often whenever we try to discuss important things.

Let’s take the environment for example. Wendell Berry put it very bluntly: “…if you are fearful of the destruction of the environment, then learn to quite being an environmental parasite.”[9] But that’s not what we do. We don’t, seriously it seems, want to call into question our habits of consumption. Rather, it seems we’re just looking to forge some technology or other that will allow us not to change our habits. We’re not leaning into the hard work of changing our habits sufficient to achieve any sort of good. We’re just looking for places to plug our car in; we’re kind of recycling. And, of course, all that’s great; we should do as much as we can to help the environment. But it seems we need more. Yet, it seems we still live in a very strange world. Again, Wendell Berry nails it, I think: “Our model citizen is a sophisticate who before puberty understands how to produce a baby, but who at the age of thirty will not know how to produce a potato.”[10] Now that’s silly, I know, but that’s us.

You see this also when we try to talk about race and racism. It easy to find folks with the right opinions, but when we start getting specific, when, for instance, we start talking about south Dallas, or ourselves, well, that’s where the conversation quite quickly begins to die. Can’t I just have a yard sign? What hashtag is hot these days? One thinks of the classic criticisms leveled against the “white liberal.”[11] Those criticisms (though, certainly, not all of them) are often right on the mark.

Now these are just two examples, and I don’t even want to get into the issues themselves; I’m not taking any sides or asking you to take any sides. It’s just that here we see often, very easily, the difference between opinions and actions—the former is easy, the latter are difficult. Again, as Berry put it, the problem is, “A change of heart or of values without a practice is only another pointless luxury or a passively consumptive life.”[12] Again, that’s us. That’s me.

And that’s why I bring this up because—as I said, not to talk about contentious issues—but to suggest that the first thing we should do is look at ourselves; I should look at myself and ask where my opinions differ from my actions. I should ask myself: how does my professed faith differ from the way I live my life? Before tackling the world’s problems, looking at ourselves is precisely what we should do.

And I think it’s what Jesus is talking about to his disciples: “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!” Don’t be a fool. Don’t be anxious. Sell your possessions; work for heavenly treasure. Jesus is pressing us to examine how we live—not just what we believe or think. But this is grown-up Christianity. This is the hard part.

And so, that’s the invitation: the invitation is to grown-up Christianity. You believe in the Lord? Wonderful. You recite the Creed? Wonderful. You believe what the Church teaches? Awesome. But let’s be honest about how all this influences our behavior. Me and you. This will indeed be painful—putting these hard questions to ourselves—but let’s lean into them. Because, really, we must; there’s no better option. Because all of this—this Gospel—is for naught if it has not changed us. Which, in time, is what we’ll learn—that frightful lesson, that frightful truth—which we will learn, if not now, certainly then. When the master “comes and knocks” to find us either asleep or awake. Amen.[13]

[1] Luke 12:15, 20

[2] Luke 12:22

[3] Luke 12:37

[4] Luke 11:28

[5] Bernard of Clairvaux, On Conversion II.3

[6] Exodus 7:3 passim

[7] Mark 3:5; 10:5; 16:14; Matthew 19:8

[8] Ephesians 4:18

[9] Wendell Berry, “Think Little,” The World-Ending Fire, 55

[10] Ibid., 52

[11] One thinks, of course, of the writings of Malcom X. See, for example, The Portable Malcom X Reader, 258: “The white liberal points out what is going on in the south but tries to hide what is going on in the north.” Also, James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time, 61: “The affluent population…they merely bought books and devoured them, but not in order to learn: in order to learn new attitudes.” But see also, Steve Biko, “Black Souls in White Skins?,” I Write What I like, 17-26

[12] Wendell Berry, “The Total Economy,” The World-Ending Fire, 67

[13] Luke 12:36

© 2022 Rev. Joshua J. Whitfield