Loving God vs. Using God - 10.09.22 (28th Sunday OT- C)

“Loving God vs. Using God”

By: Fr. David Schmidt

Theological College - Washington, DC 

Mass Readings - https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/100922.cfm

There is a major difference between loving someone vs. using them. John Paul II says that it is “A person’s rightful due is to be treated as an object of love, not as an object for use.”

Unfortunately, what we see so often in our culture today is the tendency to use people as opposed to loving them. This can be seen in any type of relationship, not just in a romantic sense. This can be seen in friendships, work relationships, family relationships, and so on. A person is used so that the other person can get what they want out of them, and then the moment they get what they desire, they ditch the person.

I imagine we are all guilty of this to some capacity. We all fail to love perfectly. We sometimes have used people to get what we wanted instead of treating them with the dignity and respect that they deserve. We can have a tendency to do this in our human relationships, and I argue, that if we aren’t careful, we can have a tendency to do this with God as well.

God desires to be in a loving relationship with us, but sometimes we tend to use Him instead of loving Him. How often have we asked God for something, and then when we get it, we go about ignoring God again until we need something else? This act of using God is something that we see in today’s Gospel.

In the story of the ten lepers, these lepers stand at a distance and request Jesus to have pity on them and to heal them. Jesus tells them to go and show themselves to the priest and on their way, they are healed.

Now one of the reasons they had to show themselves to the priest is because if a person was considered “unclean” for a variety of reasons they weren’t able to participate in Temple worship until they were made clean again through some purification ritual. Upon becoming clean, the person would then show themselves to the priest who has to examine and determine if they are truly clean. If they determine the person to be clean, then the person is permitted to return to worshipping in the Temple.

In this case the lepers had a skin disease that prevented them from worshipping in the Temple, and as long as they had this disease, they were considered unclean. Because of this, it is significant that on their way to the priest they are made clean because the priest will approve them of being able to worship in the Temple, and they can reenter society once again.

Because of this, we see just how big of a gift this was that Jesus gave these lepers by healing them. However, as we see in the passage, only 1 out of the 10 lepers returned and gave thanks to God for healing them. It can be said that based on their actions, the other 9 used Jesus to get what they wanted, and then they went off about their lives, ignoring Him.

Now it doesn’t say explicitly if the 9 actually ended up showing themselves to the priest, or if they did, it doesn’t say if they returned to the Temple to worship. Even if they did return to the Temple, to worship God after their cleansing, one could argue that their worship lacks love because it lacks gratitude since they failed to offer thanksgiving to God for bringing healing to them.

One of the ways in which we properly worship God is by giving Him thanks for the gifts and blessings that He gives to us throughout our lives. In doing so, we show our love for God by recognizing and giving thanks for His goodness and His love.

We see a good example of this proper worship and love for God in today’s readings. In the first reading, Naaman is healed of his leprosy, and desires to show his thankfulness to the prophet Elisha by giving him a gift. Elisha refuses to receive the gift, but Naaman asks for two mule-loads of earth so that he can offer sacrifice to the Lord instead of any other god.

Then in the Gospel, the one leper returns to give thanks to Jesus for healing him. Then Jesus makes an interesting comment in His response. He first asks, “Ten were cleansed, were they not? Where are the other nine? Has none but this foreigner returned to give thanks to God?” Then he said to him, “Stand up and go; your faith has saved you.”

The man showed his faith in Jesus by coming back and giving thanks to Jesus for healing him. Then Jesus says that it is the man’s faith that has saved him. What we see here is that although the other lepers believed that Jesus could heal them, they didn’t show the depth of faith that is necessary for salvation. They have been physically healed and are able to return to the Temple for worship, but they still lack the faith that they need for their salvation.

How many people today are like those nine lepers? They go to God in faith asking Him to bring them healing or to help them in their current struggle, but when the Lord brings healing to them and helps them, they fail to show the faith that is necessary for our salvation by failing to give thanks to God for what He has done for them in their lives. The Lord gives to them what they wanted, then go back to ignoring Him. People who do this, rather than receiving from the Lord and giving Him thanks. They take from Him and run away.

We need to examine our own lives and ask ourselves how often we have treated God in this way? How often have we failed to give thanks to God for all the incredible gifts that He has given to us throughout our lives? Gifts that we don’t deserve, but He gives to us out of His Fatherly love and goodness. It is important to give thanks to God because if we fail to give thanks to God for what He has given to us throughout our lives than our relationship with God is a relationship of use instead of a relationship of love.

So again, we must ask ourselves, “How often have we turned our relationship with God into a relationship of use instead of a relationship of love?”

All God desires from us is to love Him in return with a grateful heart. It brings great pain to God’s heart when we use Him to get what we want from Him and fail to love Him in return. May we always give thanks to God for the gifts and blessings that He has bestowed upon us throughout our lives, and may we strive to be in a relationship of love with our Lord instead of a relationship of use.