+ To quote an ear, throat and nose doctor — “Don’t put anything smaller than your elbow in your ear.”
In other words, keep everything out of your ear; let a doctor take care of it.
Just what is it that we should want in our lives? What needs or passions should be filled? What should we want?
Well, in the very prayer that Jesus taught us, he advises that we should want the will of God in our lives. Jesus tells us —
“Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
He tells us to ask for daily bread. He also tells us to ask for forgiveness, and to give forgiveness. He also asks that we not be led into temptation. And he asks that we be delivered from evil. And, we might ask, who is going to be delivering us from such evil? Well, it seems that is the point of both readings today.
James, in his letter to “the twelves tribes in the dispersion,” talks about people living in their passions, always wanting to possess and have more, asking wrongly, living in pride, always ready to go to war, and not resisting evil.
And then James gives to them nine commandments that he suggests would rectify their lives —
“So submit yourselves to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you of two minds. Begin to lament, to mourn, to weep. Let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into dejection. Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you.”
In short, like Paul says in Romans 13:14, “Put on Christ.”
Doesn’t that just say it perfectly? We should become like Christ, look and sound like Christ, live like Christ, and love like Christ; then all things seem to come into order. Then, we probably know what to ask for and receive — “our daily bread.”
And Jesus, while on a journey with his disciples, began to share with them the second prediction of his coming suffering and death. Did they understand what he was talking about? And if they did, were they beginning to think, like, well, if he is gone, who is going to be in charge? Who is the best or most important? Who should be next in line?”
The word does not get that specific about what they were saying, just that they were arguing. And Jesus puts his thumb on it and nails them with the question (and some would say, a rather innocuous question) —
“What were you arguing about on the way?”
(The question almost sounds like another time that Jesus asked two disciples, “What were you talking about as you walked along [the way]?”)
But as quickly and pointedly as he asked the question, Jesus answered it. An answer they did not expect, perhaps at first, but suddenly must have seen it coming, “for they were arguing about who was greatest.”
And Jesus, not scolding, but about to teach one of the most important things about true discipleship, told them —
“If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and servant of all.”
And that, my dear friends, is the way, and the road; and the ask and the answer!
