Last Sunday after Pentecost 24.11.13 Seeking the highest good
On the last Sunday of the year we think about the last of everything; the last day, the end of the world, the end of our lives, and related themes.
We are warned (by the severe tone of the Gospel) that we are playing for high stakes. These are very important realities. We must come to some sort of serious response to these things.
The more we understand about our situation the more we can make sense of this life and prepare for the next one.
We can identify three levels of response to the knowledge that things as we know them will come to an end one day.
Seeking physical safety. If we are told there could be an earthquake coming, or an asteroid is going to hit the earth, or something of that sort, we could be alarmed and simply seek refuge from the danger. But that would be merely a physical response. OK there is a disaster coming; let’s see how we can minimise the damage and the loss of life.
No thought, necessarily, for whether we should change the way we are living, or repent of our sins. Just try to stay alive.
Today’s Gospel and several other passages in the Bible put the matter in simple terms: either you line up with the will of God or you will see your entire world torn apart, and yourself with it.
This should move people to repentance but it still may not.
It is not that God wants us to think of Him only as a possible source of punishment. He wants us to see Him in a much more positive light than that. But if we limit ourselves to physical reality we are warned that anything we pin our hopes on will be taken from us.
Seeking Heaven Taking a higher view of things we are meant to look deeper (read the signs) into the word of God; to be worried not only about the body but the soul.
I want to get to heaven and avoid hell. This is much more to the point. If I lose my life from an asteroid no great matter - as long as my soul is in a state of grace and I go to Heaven. We understand that our physical lives are nowhere as important as the life of the soul. And eternity is a long time compared with a few years on earth.
So we seek to do whatever we have to do to reach Heaven and keep out of Hell. This is certainly better than just worrying about our bodies but it is still short of where God wants us to be.
Seeking God If we want to avoid Hell, why? What is wrong with Hell? The worst thing about Hell is not the flames; not keeping company with the devil; nor any other discomfort -but the absence of God.
And the same principle applies in Heaven. The best thing about Heaven is not that we are happy all the time or able to do whatever we please - but that we are in the presence of God and can see His face.
God wants us to seek Him for His own sake. We go beyond worrying about physical safety; even beyond spiritual safety, to this highest point – seeking union with God, the greatest good we can seek; and, after all, the happiest state we can reach.
So the best way to be happy is not to seek it on too narrow a basis but let ourselves be lifted up beyond where we would ever be able to go by our own efforts; to be ec-static, taken outside of ourselves, to bask in God’s glory.
The biggest disaster facing the human race is not anything physical but that it does not and might never recognize the God who is its Creator and Saviour. To know Him better and to make Him known must be our life’s work.
No comments:
Post a Comment