Going back to the Baltimore Catechism is always interesting, conjuring up feelings and eliciting memories of a feisty little nun in those early grades. Who could ever imagine that I would eventually put 20 years of solid religious education under my belt not to mention the assorted workshops and program certificates. But on a fundamental level I recall the question "Why did God make me?" The answer that comes out almost without thought is "God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world, and to be happy with Him for ever in heaven."
Those were simplistic answers, perhaps for more simplistic times but there is great truth in the answer. Basically, God wants us to be happy as ourselves and to cooperate and be part of His plan of salvation for the world. Well, that seems a bit more complex. We tend to make things more complex. Lord knows Religions and churches, especially the Roman Church ( and Pharisees ) make things intensely complex. Rationalizations, circular logic and rules, rules, rules aplenty! It does not need to be so.
If Jesus came to teach us anything besides how much we are infinitely loved, it is how simple it can be. The first lesson is to know that God purpose built you out of intense love. God made a decision or had a mere thought of the essence of you and so you came into existence in all that entails. From our perspective that might be a planning board, DNA outlines, then conception, birth and on we went. We were 'born' and our life becomes one of love for God and discovery of our own essence and humanity in cooperation and all that love entails. Eventually, we return to God in some form.
The second lesson is to put aside all the rules and rubrics and know that salvation, cooperation and our Godliness comes at the hand of doing to others what we have done to ourselves. Jesus synthesized the Ten Commandments into two simple, yet Great Commandments. Obey those and you'll have it made.
Our problems almost always lies in how complex we make things. We make our own sets of rules to follow instead of simply just loving. We place ourselves at the center of the circle, displacing God, and make judgments going outwards to everyone else. We can even have the gall and arrogance to claim that we know what God means or intends and take snippets of Scripture to support our cause(s) and beat down others. The mere idea of beating someone with Scripture is a sign of it's malintent and wrongness at face value.
The simplicity of God's love is that we would never do unto others as we would not want to have done to ourselves. We don't ask for bread from heaven and give or throw stones at others. We don't ask God to make us whole and then rip others apart spiritually, mentally or psychologically.
For wholeness and the simplicity of love this Sunday, we pray.
Matthew 7:7-14
‘Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
‘In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.
‘Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easythat leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
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