“Loving God Above Everything” – 13th Sunday OT (A) – 7.2.23

“Loving God Above Everything”

By: Fr. David Schmidt 

St. Mark the Evangelist Parish - Holy Sepulcher Church - Butler, PA

Mass Readings- https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/070223.cfm

In the Gospel today, we hear this radical statement from Jesus. He says, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me;”

When we first hear this it may sound a little extreme and it may sound like He’s downplaying our love for our parents and for our children.

However, if we look at it more closely we realize He is calling us to a much higher love. A love that will actually enable us to love our parents and children and those around us more than we could ever imagine loving them.

We can’t love the people in our life the way we are called too if we don’t love Jesus above everything. It is only the love of Christ that enables us to properly love others. Without Christ, we are incapable of love. This is because God is love and only He can give us the ability to both give love and receive love.

In order to love others well, we have to love like Jesus did. How did Jesus love us? We have only to look to the Cross. On the Cross we see the ultimate definition of love. On the Cross we see the Son of God who came and took on our own flesh and became one of us, so that He may die for us and save us from our sins. Jesus Christ loves us with a self-giving, self-sacrificial love. A love that gives of Himself completely so that others may have life.

This is how Christ is calling us to love. We hear in the Gospel Jesus says, “whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me.” Each of us are called to share in the suffering and death of Jesus Christ. We are called to take up our cross daily and follow Him to Calvary to suffer and die with Him. This will look differently in each of our lives but the overall calling is the same. To love as Christ loved by taking up our cross each day to suffer and die with Him so that Christ may bring His life into our hearts and into this world.

In the 2nd reading, we see this truth highlighted for us as it says that we are baptized into the death of Jesus Christ. It is only by dying that we may have life. It is only by sharing in the death of Jesus Christ and loving the way He is calling us to love that we can experience the life that God desires for us to experience.

This is because the spiritual principle of this life is that we can’t share in Christ’s life without first sharing in His death, and we can’t find our life without first giving it away. In the Vatican II document, Gaudium et Spes, it says, “[man] cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of himself.”

We see this spiritual principle in the Gospel when Jesus says, “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”

This seems paradoxical and contradictory and it lead us to ask- How do I find my life if I lose it? How do I find myself by making a gift of myself? What is Jesus trying to say?

What Jesus is saying is that when it comes to our heart, if we try to grasp onto the things of this life and possess this life because we are living selfishly for ourselves, than we will lose our life.

An image to think about to help this make more sense is the difference between a closed fist and an open hand. Again, this is all in reference to our heart.

If we approach our life where we are trying to reach and grab for everything in this life with our heart, we grab a hold of it, and we hold it tightly to our heart with a clenched fist. And whatever we grab onto will slowly wither away, and we will have nothing. Versus living a life where we have a disposition of open hands and open palm where we give of ourselves, and we have this disposition where we, in giving ourselves, then open ourselves to receive, and we are able to give more. The more we give, the more are able to receive, and it becomes this cycle of outpouring love and giving love.

Another image to think about is a waterfall or some sort of fountain or spring, and as the water is falling, if you try to grab onto the water and grab hold of it, you’re not going to be able to possess any water in your hand. You try to possess it, and whatever you possess will slowly wither in your hand, and you will be left with nothing. Versus cupping your hands over the spring, and allowing the water to flow into it, without trying to grab it, but allowing it to flow through. What ends up happening is your hands are always full, and not only are they always full, but you are constantly being given new life and new love. Imagine if this water was God’s life and God’s love that He is desiring to pour into your heart.

So to bring it back to the beginning. If we love anything in this life more than we love Christ even the good things of this life such as our family and friends than we are taking the approach of reaching and grabbing and trying to possess the things of this life. When we do that we will lose our life because in the end we will be left empty.

However, if we love Christ over everything, including those that we love, than we will gain our lives because we will be loving as Christ loves which is a self-giving, self-sacrificial love. When we give of ourselves fully, by following Christ in taking up our cross each day, and laying down our lives for others, we open ourselves up to receive not only Christ’s love which continually pours into our heart, but we open ourselves up more fully to receive others and to love them with the love of Jesus, thus loving them more than we could ever imagine ourselves loving them. And that’s because loving Jesus above all things increases our capacity to love.

One really good example of this is having children. One of the joys that I have had in my life is recently how a lot of my friends are beginning their families and having young kids and asking them about the difference between before having kids and afterwards. And a lot of them said how in having children they discovered a love within themselves that they did not know that they had, and they had an increased capability to love. This is because when you have children, there is a sense of pouring yourself out for another. You are no longer living for yourself, but you are living for another.

I remember another friend of mine, he said that one of the things that he found out was that with each kid that he had, it was almost like his love grew exponentially. Where there might be a worry that after having the first kid we wonder how I could love the first child with the same love when I have more children. It was a great way of him explaining it because he said actually I was able to love him more because I had a greater capacity to love, and the more children that he had, he felt this greater increase of love come upon him.

This is a great reflection of God the Father’s love. He is infinitely pouring Himself out, and in infinitely pouring Himself out He brings great life and love into this world as He loves all of His children with this great and infinite love.

I use this example, but it’s not the only way this can happen. If you are not married there are other ways that you can give of yourself that increases your capability to love. Also, when it comes to somebody who has 10 kids vs. somebody who has 2 kids, that doesn’t mean that the parent who has 10 kids loves their children more than the one with 2. We find these different ways in our lives, whatever the Lord is asking us to do this, in giving ourselves away it increases our capability to love the people in our life and the people around us.  

So the two questions that we can ask ourselves today. The first is “Jesus what are the attachments in my heart that I love more than you? My family, friends, possessions, etc.? Asking Jesus this question, “What am I attached too?” So He can allow us to detach from these things, so that we can freely love Him.

And then the 2nd question is “Jesus, how are you calling me to give myself away to others and to you?” Again this is going to look differently in each one of our lives, but we ask “Lord, how are you asking me to give of myself to others and to you?”

We ask these questions knowing that when we give ourselves away, and no longer live for the things of this world that we will truly find our life as our hearts will be fully opened to receive God’s life and love into our hearts, thus enabling us to love God above all things and to love those in our lives with the love of Jesus Christ.