The way forward

In the United States this week, a general will make a long-awaited report and the nation’s leaders will furiously debate the course of a war.

By the strange paths of chance (or of providence), on this very Sunday, the long-set cycle of the Lectionary gives us today’s first reading (Wisdom 9:13-18b):

For the deliberations of mortals are timid,
and unsure are our plans.

For the corruptible body
burdens the soul
and the earthen shelter
weighs down the mind that has many concerns.

And scarce do we guess the things on earth,
and what is within our grasp we find with difficulty….

Today’s Gospel (Luke 14:25-33) seems even more appropriate for this week’s counsels of war.

Or what king marching into battle would not first sit down
and decide whether with ten thousand troops
he can successfully oppose another king
advancing upon him with twenty thousand troops?
But if not, while he is still far away,
he will send a delegation to ask for peace terms.

But this passage is more than just a question about prudence in war, as the very next verse makes clear:

In the same way,
anyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions
cannot be my disciple.

The gist of the Gospel is that each of us needs to be very clear in our minds that true Christian discipleship requires dramatic choices and sometimes incurs very dramatic costs.

In making the choice for Christ, as well as in many other choices that confront us in this dangerous world, our decision-making process is often entangled by concerns about physical comfort and safety – sometimes even to the point of our making a bad decision or making no decision – to the ruin of all.

For the deliberations of mortals are timid,
and unsure are our plans.

For the corruptible body
burdens the soul
and the earthen shelter
weighs down the mind that has many concerns.

Yet we are not without help: God gives his gifts of wisdom to those who seek him and enables us to disentangle our minds from foolish and conflicting concerns so that we may see things aright and move forward by God’s grace through the challenges of this life to the eternal joy prepared for us in Christ.

Who ever knew your counsel,
except you had given Wisdom
and sent your holy spirit from on high?

And thus were the paths of those on earth made straight,
and men learned what was your pleasure,
and were saved by Wisdom.