Single Minded

 

31^st Sunday in Ordinary Time

Cycle B

Dt. 6:2-6

Heb 7:23-28

Mk 12: 28b-34

 

What motivates you? What is the most important thing in your life, the one thing you cannot do without, the one thing that really defines you? What would you be willing to give everything else up to obtain?

 

I myself have a hard time defining what that is. Maybe it’s my personality. I am not a particularly driven person. I do not throw myself fully into my career or a project or even any of my many roles. I am more of a generalist. I like to do a lot of things and many things interest me, but I do not get my sense of purpose out of the things I do. I tend to get it out of my relationships. Maybe you’re same way or maybe you do have things in your life that you are so passionate about that nothing else matters. If you do I envy you in a way, because I think the people who make the most difference in the world are those who can be single minded.

 

I hear passages like these this today and wonder if it is even possible to be so single minded. How can I love God with all my heart, all my mind, all my soul, and all my strength? Wouldn’t that mean there’s no room for anything else? There is so much going on in my life that demands my attention. I find it difficult enough to love those closest to me with that much devotion and focus. There are so many things that excite me, that make me feel good, and so many other things that worry me, that take up so much energy. How can I even take the time to focus so much of myself on God? And why does God demand such attention and devotion?

 

I would think that many of you are driven by certain goals, goals that you do devote all your heart, mind, soul and strength to. Lofty, important goals. Many of you are very successful in your careers and have acquired lots of wonderful things along the way that are signs of your success. I imagine you have to sacrifice a lot of things to do whatever it takes to get you what you really feel is important in life. But does that make you happy? Is that all there is? Are we really focused on what is truly our purpose here in life? These are questions I hope we all struggle with.

 

And I struggle with this a lot. I can understand how someone can be so driven and focused on earthly things like a career or relationships, but how can we be so focused on a God we cannot see, on a God that is so often overshadowed by all those other things we focus on in our lives? Those things are front and center. I don’t always see God that starkly or obviously. God stuff floats in and out of my thoughts and my days. Sometimes I think of him throughout the day but oftentimes He is pushed into the background by the whirlwind of my life.

 

I spent some time this week pondering what types of people are single minded. I thought of athletes, especially those at high levels whose goal is to win a championship or a gold medal. They visualize themselves winning that medal, they work with coaches and train using the latest techniques and eat special diets. Top athletes have to be that obsessed and focused in order to succeed.

 

I thought of priests and bishops and people living the consecrated life, especially monks. Their days and nights are caught up in God stuff, in prayer and sacrament, service, being there for the people. God is their job, they don’t have all the other things the rest of us do to distract us, right? God is front and center for them all day long, so it’s easier for them.

 

I thought of lovers, especially those in the early stages of their relationships, when all they can think about is their beloved, and it actually hurts physically when they are apart. I thought of those who are suffering. Suffering can really focus you. And I thought of their caregivers, who are focused on the love they have for the person they are caring for. When you have to take care of someone, especially someone who is helpless, you go to extraordinary lengths to organize your life and your time. They become the center of your life.

 

This last week Nancy and I had our one-year old grandson staying with us while our son and his wife were on a trip. Boy, I had forgotten how all-consuming having a toddler is. We had to rearrange our entire lives for him, from baby proofing the house to giving up some of the activities we had wanted to do, to feeding, changing and playing with him on his schedule, not ours. We could never let him out of our sight. Even when he was asleep we listened to him on the baby monitor. I began to see how I might begin to devote all my heart, all my mind, all my strength to someone.

 

And I also witnessed single mindedness in him as he constantly fixated on the dog’s water bowl. Every time we would take him away from it he just crawled back to it, again and again and again. He was obsessed. Maybe that’s what Jesus was talking about when he said that we will not enter the Kingdom unless we become like little children.

 

Can I be obsessed with God? Can I grow in love for Him so that no matter what sidetracks me I keep crawling back, again and again and again? I hope I can. But it will require me giving up all those other things that I have thought to be important and submit to what God wants for my life. It will require not just setting the proper priorities but actually removing and reducing the things that keep me from focusing on God alone. Jesus said to seek first the Kingdom of God, and all its righteousness, and everything else will come to us. Like an athlete, those are the fundamentals we need to master before everything else can happen. We need to lay the foundation of our relationship with God first and firmly, and not worry about the rest so much. It will happen if we submit to His divine will.

 

Both Moses and Jesus ties that submission to understanding and keeping God’s commandments. God ties happiness to keeping his commandments because they are all about how we are to live in relationship, both with God and with one another. We will be happy if we do not steal, kill, covet, or be unfaithful, and other people will also be happy if we don’t do those things. The commandments are natural and true and how we were created to live. If we live as we are created to live then we will be happy. Moses says today that we will grow and prosper the more. Jesus says that if we keep the commandments we will be close to the Kingdom of God.

 

I find it interesting that Jesus does not say that the second commandment is also to love your neighbor with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, and with all your strength. He only says to love your neighbor as yourself. But that assumes the same single mindedness we must have for God when it comes to our neighbor. And it also assumes you love yourself with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul and with all your strength.

 

It’s all tied together.  Because if you love your neighbor you can’t help but love God. If you love God you cannot help but love your neighbor. If you truly loved yourself as you should you would be loving God. If you love God and your neighbor you will be loving yourself.

 

What motivates you? What is the most important thing in your life, the one thing you cannot do without, the one thing that really defines you? What would you be willing to give everything else up to obtain? Is it God? Is God that important to you? Is life eternal with God the most worthwhile goal you could have? Is it worth giving it all you’ve got?

 

Believe it or not, you and your life are the most important thing to God. God loves you with all his heart, with all his mind, and with all his strength. You are the one thing God chooses not to do without. He was willing to give up his very life for you so that you could have the chance to live forever with Him. That’s God’s goal for you. All you have to do is accept it as your own.