IF YOU WISH TO BE PERFECT

Ez 24,15-24; C Dt 32,18-21; Mt 19,16-22
20 AUGUST
A man asks Jesus what good he must do to have eternal life. Who knows the Ancient Scripture know that eternal life comes from obedience to the Word of God. First of all Jesus makes it clear that only one is good: his Father, the Lord and the Creator. If only one is good, even from this only one all the good that is in the world is born. The good is nothing but a gift of God’s love. However, the gift of God is conditioned to man’s obedience. Who lives in the Word is always blessed by God and walks from blessing to blessing. Who does not walk in the Word is cut off from the source of good and he is like a tree cut at the roots. It does not produce any good fruit. This clarification already prepares us to understand where the fault of this man resides after that Jesus will have made him the great promise of perfection.

This man wants eternal life. Jesus points it to him. The path of salvation is the commandments. Not satisfied, the man asks Jesus to show him what the commandments leading to the path are. Jesus tells him them. “You will not kill, you will not commit adultery, you will not steal, you will not testify the false, honour the father and the mother and you will love your neighbour as yourself”. As we can see, Jesus leaves the three commandments dedicated to God and focuses on those dedicated to man. Why does he not remind the commandments towards God? He does not remind them because these are the commandments that reveal the truth of faith and man’s obedience. The apostle John says it clearly: we know that we love God if we love our neighbour.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also must love one another. No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us. This is how we know that we remain in him and he in us, that he has given us of his Spirit. Moreover, we have seen and testify that the Father sent his Son as saviour of the world. Whoever acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him and he in God. We have come to know and to believe in the love God has for us. God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him. In this is love brought to perfection among us, that we have confidence on the day of judgment because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment, and so one who fears is not yet perfect in love. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, “I love God,” but hates his brother, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. This is the commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother (1Jn 4,11-21).

To this man Jesus asks for a leap of love. He asks him to move from love towards himself to love for others, from only saving himself to saving many other hearts, placing his life at the service of Jesus, for the redemption of the world. The man goes away sad. He had many goods. His heart was in his goods, not in love for others.

Now someone approached him and said, “Teacher, what good must I do to gain eternal life?” He answered him, “Why do you ask me about the good? There is only One who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.” He asked him, “Which ones?” And Jesus replied, ” ‘You shall not kill; you shall not commit adultery; you shall not steal; you shall not bear false witness; honour your father and your mother’; and ‘you shall love your neighbour as yourself.'” The young man said to him, “All of these I have observed. What do I still lack?” Jesus said to him, “If you wish to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to (the) poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” When the young man heard this statement, he went away sad, for he had many possessions.

The salvation of the world requires people who pass from the love of “selfishness”, that is, love that thinks only to personal salvation, to love of charity, which is the total giving of one’s life in the service of the Gospel. Even by cultivating the goods of the earth we must move from thinking only of ourselves to also thinking of others.

Mother of mercy, Angels and Saints ensure that the Christian lives in the service of the brothers.