Twenty-fourth Sunday Ordinary Time B

September 13. 2015

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I remember one wedding I presided at.

The bride was pale, the groom was shaking, and both had forgotten everything they'd practiced at the rehearsal.

Finally the moment arrived, and I asked the big question: "Do you, James, take Heather here present to be your lawful wife?"

With a shaky voice the groom responded, "I do???"

"Nice try, James," I said . "Now, could you try it without the question mark?"

In Sunday's Gospel Jesus is urging us to try life without the question mark.

He's pleading with us not to settle for half a life, but to be fully in­vested and hold nothing back.

Listen to what he says: "Whoever would save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake will save it."

He's warning us about our ingrained habit of hedging our bets and holding back, keeping our eye on the nearest exit, and always making sure we've got a way out.

Now that's a great survival strategy for investors, and poker players, and, but it's a recipe for failure at the core of life.

For if our real life work is to help one another grow into masterpieces, then nothing less than our best efforts will do.

Nothing less than investing everything we've got in building up God's kingdom within us and around us.

To let our fears cause us to withhold any part of ourselves from our life's work is a recipe for lifetime failure, sadness, and isolation.

Holding tight to what we've already got is a sure formula for dying from the inside out.

Jesus is telling us we have an alternative - lose our lives in order to save them.

It seems a strange paradox, but if we've been paying attention, we've probably already discovered a bit of how it works.

Just one example: At times we've all had the experience of connecting intensely with someone w trust.

As we talked to that person and listened, it was as if the whole rest of the world fell away and ceased to exist.

We forgot about ourselves, our image, how we looked, and whether we were hungry.

For a few moments we gave our whole attention, we gave away our whole self to the other.

And, in return for our gift, we found that we had become more on the inside.

The pattern repeats itself in every part of our life:

When we give our best self into any moment, into any interaction, and hold nothing back and let all that is secondary fall away, we find to our surprise that we become more, much more.

It is that "something more" that Jesus wants for us.