Listen Carefully, My Child

Homily for Wednesday of the Third Week in Lent

The Rule of St. Benedict, written as a guide for life in a monastic religious community, opens with these words: “Listen carefully, my son, to the master’s instructions, and attend to them with the ear of your heart… The labor of obedience will bring you back to him from whom you have drifted through the sloth of disobedience.”

Many of the people who find obedience to be oppressive has been caused by their opinion that obedience leads to slavery and stupidity. However, both St. Benedict and Moses, who appears in today’s first reading, tell us that obedience leads to wisdom and intelligence.

In Psalm 147, the statutes and decrees of the Lord are looked upon as gifts from God, a gift that has not been given to any other nation. Both Moses and the psalmist are of the opinion that other nations will see what God has done for the children of Israel and will stand in awe at God’s providential care for them. The statutes and decrees of God are looked upon as being boundaries that will keep Israel on the path that leads to freedom and their own country which they are about to enter.

In the Gospel text for today, Jesus insists that he has not come to abolish the law; rather, Jesus has come to amplify, to enhance, to fulfill the law.

The word “obedience” comes to us from the Latin word meaning “to listen.” Obedience must refer to a willingness to listen to each other, to what God says to us through them and their needs, to listen to what our circumstances or environment are asking of us. To ignore or to harden our hearts against the needs of others will lead to destruction and ignorance and chaos.

God’s the statutes and decrees are a gift; consequently, we are free to ignore them. God has given us each a free will. To ignore any gift is foolishness. To obey is wisdom and intelligence.