Monday, August 21, 2017

Friends, today’s Gospel is the story of the rich young man. The rich young man has a deep desire to share in everlasting life. He is hungry for the infinite good of the spirit. He knows what he wants, and he knows where to find it. Jesus is the infinite Good that the souls wants. He is God’s own self made flesh.

If you want to live in friendship with God, there are certain things that you must cut out of your life. Friendship with God means a life of love; therefore, those things that egregiously violate love have to be eliminated.

Jesus looks at him with love and says, “There is one thing more you must do. Go and sell what you have and give it to the poor; you will have treasure in heaven. After that come follow me.” God is nothing but love, straight through, and therefore the life of friendship with him, in the richest sense, is a life of total love, self-forgetting love.

But at this point, the young man tragically balks. The spiritual life, at the highest pitch, is about giving your life away, and this is why his many possessions are a problem.