What Must I Do?

Gospel: Matthew 10: 17-27

In answer to the question of what must be done to enter the kingdom of God, we human beings have fashioned any number of answers to this question, all of which are designed to be vicarious replacements for the answer of Jesus that is just not palatable to us.  We speak of obligatory church attendance, reception of this or that ritual, offering this or that set of prayers, holding to certain creeds and beliefs.  All of it is very nice, but it exists to avoid Jesus' answer to the question.

In the first part, Jesus says to keep the parts of the Ten Commandments regarding our relations with our neighbor, i.e. do no harm to other people.  That's easy enough, but the second part is much harder: now we must give of ourselves to care for the poor, i.e. to do positive good to our neighbor, to both friend and foe.  Now things get difficult; we can't abide that.  So, we invent the vicarious practices to pretend we are about the kingdom of God when in fact we are not.  

The only way to love God in the world is the same way Jesus loved God in the world - by showing mercy and caring for others, by doing positive good for others in a self-giving, self-sacrificing way.  Everything else is avoidance and an attempt to enter by some other way.  Today is a day to recommit to the way of Jesus and care for our neighbor through compassion and mercy.