TEACH ME WISDOM - 23RD SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (9/4/2022)

23RD SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
September 4, 2022


Wisdom 9:13-18
Psalm 90
Philemon 9-10, 12-17
Luke 14: 25-33

TEACH ME WISDOM

The word of God presents wisdom as one of the greatest gifts we can receive from the Lord. Scriptural wisdom is knowing God and God's plan for us - very practical wisdom indeed!

WISDOM

Our first reading is an excerpt from the Book of Wisdom, chapter 9, called "Solomon's prayer for wisdom." The verses read today describe the limitations of human knowledge and the need for God to reveal his wisdom to us.

I confess that my love for this particular chapter goes back at least five decades. I remember when I realized that Solomon prayed this prayer and was known as the wisest man on earth, I figured it would work for me also. I have prayed it often ever since.

The Responsorial, Psalm 90, is likewise a prayer for wisdom: "Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain wisdom of heart."

GOSPEL

Today's gospel, typical of St. Luke, spells out the cost of discipleship in no uncertain terms. The call is radical: "If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple." Even the closest family relationships cannot stand in the way of following the Lord.

The verses that follow, about counting the cost before building a tower or waging war, are unique to Luke's gospel. St. Luke connects them to renouncing one's possessions. This kind of radical renunciation is indeed great wisdom - the wisdom of the cross.

PHILEMON

The second reading is from the shortest of St. Paul's epistles, the Letter to Philemon. Philemon's slave, Onesimus, stole something and ran away. Onesimus was captured and put in prison. There he met St. Paul and was converted to Christ.

Paul, rather than keep Onesimus with him as his servant, sends him back to Philemon. Paul asks that Philemon treat the runaway "no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a brother." This sentiment is echoed in the Christmas carol, "O Holy Night": "Chains shall He break for the slave is our brother; and in His name all oppression shall cease."

WISDOM THROUGH THE CROSS

St. Paul tells us in 1Corinthians 1 about the wisdom of the cross. The cross brings its own unique kind of wisdom. "For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God" (1 Cor. 1:18).

One of today's lessons is that discipleship means discipline and the cross. Only through the self-denial involved in that will come true wisdom.

May the Lord Jesus, the power and wisdom of God, impart his very power and wisdom to us!