Jesus says a lot of things
in this brief series of blessings and woes.
Some of them are surprising:
the poor possess the kingdom of God;
the hungry will be filled;
the weeping will laugh;
those hated, excluded, and insulted
will receive a great reward.
Some of them are disturbing:
woe to the rich,
whose reward is earthly, not heavenly;
woe to the full,
who will find themselves hungry;
woe to the laughing,
who will find themselves weeping;
woe to those who are spoken well of,
because this is the sign of a false prophet.
Some of them are surprising:
the poor possess the kingdom of God;
the hungry will be filled;
the weeping will laugh;
those hated, excluded, and insulted
will receive a great reward.
Some of them are disturbing:
woe to the rich,
whose reward is earthly, not heavenly;
woe to the full,
who will find themselves hungry;
woe to the laughing,
who will find themselves weeping;
woe to those who are spoken well of,
because this is the sign of a false prophet.
In these few words, Jesus says a lot:
a lot of things that surprise and disturb us,
a lot of things that seem unlikely
in terms of how we think the world works,
and a lot of things that call
our own lives into question.
Am I one of the poor, the hungry,
the weeping, and the hated,
or am I among the rich and satiated,
the laughing and admired?
How must my life change
in light of all this that Jesus says?
Jesus says a lot of things
in these few words,
but something he doesn’t say is,
“I don’t really mean all of this.”
He doesn’t say,
“This doesn’t apply to you.”
He doesn’t say,
“Feel free to ignore this
if it doesn’t fit in
with your plans or worldview.”
These blessing and woes
are given to us by Jesus
to tell us how the world is
when seen from God’s perspective,
and to direct us how to live
in the world as God sees it.
Maybe the reason
that we try to convince ourselves
that Jesus didn’t mean what he said,
or that it doesn’t apply to us,
or that it is optional
is that we don’t yet see the world
the way that God sees it.
We see a world in which the poor
are simply losers in the game of life,
the hungry haven’t worked hard enough,
the weeping need to get themselves together,
and the reviled and rejected need to learn
how to go along to get along in the real world.
Jesus’ words seem to ask us to become
everything that our world tells us to avoid
and that it blames people for being;
his words ask us to lament being
everything that our world tells us to desire
and that it praises people for attaining.
But we are often like the ones
of whom the prophet Jeremiah speaks,
who trust in human beings,
and seek their strength in flesh.
And we are this way
because we don’t see the possibilities
that Jesus has unleashed in the world
through his life and his death
and, above all, his resurrection.
of whom the prophet Jeremiah speaks,
who trust in human beings,
and seek their strength in flesh.
And we are this way
because we don’t see the possibilities
that Jesus has unleashed in the world
through his life and his death
and, above all, his resurrection.
St. Paul writes to the Corinthians,
“If Christ has not been raised,
your faith is vain.”
The blessing and woes
that Jesus lays before us
only make sense in a world
in which the dead do not stay dead.
To see the world
through Jesus’s resurrection—
to see the world with Easter eyes—
is to see a world in which
the rejected are raised.
It is to see a world in which
the poor and the hungry and the weeping
have hope in God for food and consolation,
for the kingdom is now
already appearing among us.
The resurrection of Jesus
is like an underground stream
that has burst through
to the surface of the earth
to sweep away the old world
of riches and luxuries,
of shallow joys and hollow praise,
to water the dry land of our hearts,
carving new channels of grace.
St. Paul writes,
“If for this life only we have hoped in Christ,
we are the most pitiable people of all.”
Commenting on Paul’s words,
the theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar wrote,
“Belief in the resurrection is a high-stakes game
in which the player has bet the bank
and, if there is no resurrection, loses.”
If we listen to the words of Jesus
about those who are
poor and hungry,
weeping and despised,
and he turns out to be
just one more good man
who has gone down
into death’s darkness,
then the world is right to pity
our foolishness and weakness.
But if “Christ has been raised from the dead,
the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep,”
then our foolishness is wisdom
and our weakness is power.
“If for this life only we have hoped in Christ,
we are the most pitiable people of all.”
Commenting on Paul’s words,
the theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar wrote,
“Belief in the resurrection is a high-stakes game
in which the player has bet the bank
and, if there is no resurrection, loses.”
If we listen to the words of Jesus
about those who are
poor and hungry,
weeping and despised,
and he turns out to be
just one more good man
who has gone down
into death’s darkness,
then the world is right to pity
our foolishness and weakness.
But if “Christ has been raised from the dead,
the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep,”
then our foolishness is wisdom
and our weakness is power.
So in the end, it comes down to this:
do you believe that Jesus Christ is alive?
Do you hear in his blessings and woes
not a voice from the distant past
that echoes faintly down the ages
in the memory of his followers,
but the living voice of the one
who is calling you from death to life?
Do you hear the voice of one
calling you forth from the tomb
of riches and self-satisfaction,
of shallow joy and empty glory?
Do you hear his voice this day
ringing in your ears
as it rang in the ears of his disciples,
calling you to follow him
on a journey whose destination
you cannot see,
but which faith tells you
ends in the mystery
of God’s eternal love?
Hear the Good News:
Jesus is alive
and he is calling you to follow him:
from death to life,
from woe to blessing.
Let us pray for the grace
to answer that call,
and that God, in his mercy,
might have mercy on us all.
Jesus is alive
and he is calling you to follow him:
from death to life,
from woe to blessing.
Let us pray for the grace
to answer that call,
and that God, in his mercy,
might have mercy on us all.
