“Today salvation has come to this house
because this man too is a descendant of Abraham.—
Depending upon who got to us first, we carry differing perceptions of God. These range from visions of God as a punishing strict arbitrar of justice, to God as the laissez-faire overseer who doesn’t get much involved in the day-to-day affairs of men, to God as an all loving pappy who doesn’t much care what we do, as long as we don’t really hurt anyone.
We live with preconceived notions, the beliefs and feelings that come out of our experiences, out of our earliest memories, the picture painted by those who taught and trained us.
Those notions, beliefs, and feelings require the occasional adult reality check.
Brothers and sisters,
Let’s take that reality check.
Our first reading, from the appropriately named Book of Wisdom tells us that God has mercy on all, because He can do all things. Wisdom also tells us that God overlook[s] people’s sins that they may repent.
The reality is that God is merciful to us. He is merciful, not so we can do as we please, but so we can become what is our destiny, the perfection of humanity.
Humanity perfected is what Christ came to call us to be. It is humanity that takes up His name, humanity that repents of its sin.
Wisdom further tells us that God love[s] all things that are, and loathe[s] nothing that [He has] made.
In other words, God made us, fashioned us, and we remain simply for this reason, because God wills it so. Wisdom asks:
how could a thing remain, unless you willed it;—¨
or be preserved, had it not been called forth by you?
Listening to that we know that we have the assurance, by our very being, that we are willed to being by God. God has called us forth and He preserves us. He spares us because we are His. And, He loves us.
The most beautiful thought is this:
O LORD and lover of souls,
…your imperishable spirit is in all things!
God is in us.
The reality is that we bear likeness to Him. Our likeness to Him is in our ability to be more and more like Him, in every decision we make for Him, and in our doing every good and holy thing He taught.
My friends,
In our likeness to God is the promise that we will be reunited to Him one day.
We draw closer and closer to Him each day, when we pray, when His grace enters us in the sacraments, when we meet our brothers and sisters and see in them the likeness of Christ.
When we stumble on the way to God we are not doomed. Rather we are called to repent, to come back and reclaim our place in His family. In that we draw ever closer to Him.
Brothers and sisters,
Our reality check continues with St. Paul as he tells the people of Thessalonica, and us:
We always pray for you,—¨
that our God may make you worthy of his calling—¨
and powerfully bring to fulfillment every good purpose
and every effort of faith,—¨
that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you,—¨
and you in him.
The apostles, the saints, the entire Church prays each day. They and we pray that God bring us to fulfillment.
Fulfillment is this, that the imperishable spirit of God that is in us continues to perfect us, continues to draw us closer and closer, transforming us to perfection in Him.
That is the joy of the Church. That in Jesus Christ we become perfect.
In Jesus Christ we are fulfilled and perfected, not by magic or hocus-pocus, but by the reality of God among us. God as he came to Zacchaeus saying:
“Today salvation has come to this house—¨
because this man too is a descendant of Abraham.—
It is no less for us. We too are descendants of Abraham, grafted onto the chosen people, adopted and born of the Spirit of God. Salvation has come to us.
That is the adult reality of faith. That is the truth of the sacraments.
By baptism we are grated onto the Church, onto the new Israel. By penance we are strengthened to avoidance of sin and to a spirit of true repentance. By the Eucharist we are transformed into the very likeness of Jesus.
These graces, and the others available to us, transform us as Zacchaeus’ encounter with Jesus transformed him.
Zacchaeus was once again able to sing along with the psalmist this song of praise and thanksgiving:
The LORD is gracious and merciful,—¨
slow to anger and of great kindness.—¨
The LORD is good to all—¨
and compassionate toward all his works.
Zacchaeus, and all of us have this reality check stated in Jesus’ own words.
—For the Son of Man has come
to seek—¨and to save what was lost.”
That is God, that is who He is.
Amen.