The poetic imagination of the biblical writers seems to know no bounds in their attempt to describe our relationship with God. God is imaged as shepherd, king, rock, eagle, potter, father and, today, Isaiah refers to the motherhood of God. Prior to today’s passage Isaiah describes God’s giving birth to a new creation and he uses the language of childbirth, “But now, I cry out as a woman in labor, gasping and panting.”
Today the mothering image for God continues. The people are in exile and in the preceding verse Isaiah assures the exiles, “For the Lord comforts his people and shows mercy to his afflicted” (49:13). There should be a “But” to begin the quote of what Zion says, “But the Lord has forsaken me….”, indicating the people’s reluctance to believe that God is really coming to their aid.
Some people suffer for a long time clinging to God as their only hope when there are no visible signs of help on the horizon. While others despair that God will help them. They might conclude, in their desperation, that God is angry with them for past offenses, has forgotten them or, doesn’t care for them at all! They would be the ones to say, “But the Lord has forsaken me….”
People who work in prisons will say that even offenders who have done horrible things still get visits from their mothers after long years in prison, when other friends and family have given up on them and dropped away. I remember talking to a prisoner who had been in prison ten years and had a life sentence. He said, “Not even my mother visits me anymore Father. I am dead to the outside world.”
That may be what the Israelites felt after years in exile. Had even God stopped caring for them? Would God take notice and come to visit them in their prison and set them free? Hence the need for Isaiah to draw on a powerful and persuasive image to console the doubting and exhausted exiles — God’s motherly love. God responds to the people’s lament, “Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb?” A mother’s love is unfailing and so is God’s. But even should the unimaginable happen — a mother forsake her child — God promises not to forget the people God gave birth to: “Even should she forget, I will never forget you.”
There wasn’t much to hold the scattered exiles together as a faith community. Their Temple had been destroyed, their monarchy lost and they had been forcibly removed from their homeland. So, when Isaiah needed to draw on one social unit that was still in tact and visible even in exile, he used the metaphor of motherhood and the family. The home and domestic life provided Isaiah with the images he needed to persuade the people that God had not forgotten them and that God was still trustworthy. Drawing on the previous example — even if a mother should stop visiting her child in prison, God would still show up.
The past three weeks we have heard readings from chapter 5 in Matthew. Now we are in chapter 6; still part of the Sermon on the Mount and still addressing similar issues: the life style of a disciple who is living in the present and anticipating the fullness of the kingdom of God. Previous weeks we heard how we were to treat one another. The topic was relationships. Now the focus is on how a disciple is to look upon and use material goods.
Just previous to today’s passage (vv. 19-21) Jesus told his disciples not to accumulate wealth — God was to be their treasure. Today he says the same thing in another way, “No one can serve two masters….” In a time of still high unemployment and a growing gap between the rich and the poor, how can Jesus tell us not to “worry” about food, drink and clothing?
Surely we are to provide for what is needed for our life and the welfare of our families. That would be normal. But Jesus is warning about a preoccupying or consuming worry which makes money and material things our new master. If our focus is elsewhere, it is not on God. Such worry about material goods might also make us: less concerned about our relationships, even within our own family; have less tendency to share with the needy and be aware of their needs in the larger community; more likely to use earth’s resources for our own purposes and less conserving of the fruits of the earth for others; less welcoming of the newcomer for fear of having to share with them what we claim is our due.
Jesus would have us remember: God is the creator, everything else we pursue is created. Focusing on created things can cause us to forget God, who is the source of all that is good. If God is our focus, then the things that concern God about our world should also concern us as well.
Along with half of the country, we had a very cold winter here in Texas. One morning I passed a dead bird on the frozen grass. It probably starved to death. How can Jesus use birds, which are always scurrying for food, as examples of God’s care and feeding? I don’t think Jesus is talking about the survival of animal life. He wants to shift our consciousness to see other possibilities. Life is much bigger than just worrying about survival. This is not to deny that in parts of the world today that’s exactly what people are doing. For most of us listening to the gospel today Jesus wants to open our eyes to our creator God who is concerned about us and the well being of the distressed of the world. If we accept this description of God, then we can lower our inner anxiety level about ourselves and turn to those who lack and who are the focus of God’s concern.
Solomon was noted for his wisdom and for the splendor of his royal household. People came from near and far to hear him speak and see the opulence of his court and the glory of the Temple he built. Who wouldn’t want to be like Solomon? Yet, Jesus says, even a simple bird is arrayed in grander splendor than Solomon. Instead of having as our goal what Solomon had, Jesus turns to a simple bird, a flower and even the grass. Jesus isn’t saying we shouldn’t eat, drink or dress, but that our worth in God’s eyes doesn’t come from things — contrary to how the world measures a person’s worth.
Instead, we have our splendor and glory from God and that should come first in our minds and hearts. How much is a person worth in God’s eyes? Even more than the wealth of Solomon. Our worth is what we have within us and that is a free gift of God. Nothing we own, or can do for ourselves, gains us value in God’s eyes — God’s grace is the only sure source of our true “splendor.”
FIRST THINGS FIRST
“Set your hearts on the kingdom of God and his justice first; all other things will be given to you as well.” Jesus could not have said it more clearly. His followers must, first of all, seek the “kingdom of God and His justice”. Everything else is secondary. Are today’s Christians really working to make this world more just and humane as God wants us to be? Or, perhaps, are we spending our energies on other secondary matters?
This isn’t just another question. It is essential to know if we are really faithful to our main call, set up by Jesus, and not distracted by our own religiosity that has nothing to do with the passion that moved Jesus’ heart. We have to redirect our own goals and bring our Christianity in line with Jesus’ project of the kingdom of God.
Jesus’ attitude is all too clear. One has simply to read the gospels.
Jesus is moving among the people, working for a more just, healthy and brotherly Galilee, with special attention to the poor and the destitute, but Jesus never hesitates to stand up against a religion that observed only the Sabbath and all forms of cult, while forgetting God’s command to be merciful and not merely offering sacrifices.
Christianity is not just another religion that answers the needs of every human being for a supreme power or God. Christianity is a prophetic religion that starts with Jesus bringing God’s message to make this world more just and humane. We might work together as religious communities and offer worship and services that satisfy the human need for the divine; but if we are not inspired by compassion and the need for justice and defend the least and the downtrodden, what have we done of Jesus’ message that motivated his whole life?
Perhaps one practical way to redirect our Christian communities towards the kingdom of God and his justice may be by way of hospitality. We must not give up our worship celebrations; but we must develop much more our welcoming availability and our presence wherever there is a need for company, listening and help. We must respond to people who need support, work, and hope. We must care and share with the people in need, and that will make own objective clearer: to use the Gospel as an inspiration to make this world just and humane.
In his first encyclical, John Paul II, echoing a key idea from Vatican Council II, reminded all Christians about how we ought to understand the Church. In very clear terms, he said: “The Church is not an end in itself; rather it leads us to the kingdom of God, of which it is a symbol, sign and instrument.” If we want to make the Church truly evangelical, we must work within it to make this world more just and humane.