The Purchase (2014-07-27)

SUNDAY July 27, 2014   / 17^th Sunday, Year A

Readings:  1 Kings 3:5, 7-12 | Psalm 119 | Romans 8:28-30 | Matthew 13:44-52

[__01__]     One of the most important – if not the most important – financial transactions of our lives is the purchase of a home.

Often, this would mean not only the ownership of a building/structure with living room, kitchen, bathrooms and bedrooms but also the title, the deed, the right to the land.

Buying a house – whether sitting on a fraction of an acre or multiple acres – would give the owner the right to the land.

[__02__]     Of course, the purchase of a home brings both excitement and concern for the owner, the buyer about the foundation, plumbing, electrical.

We would want the advice and guidance of a good attorney/legal counsel and banker/financial adviser so that we would sign our name to a contract for a home we can reasonably afford.

Such a transaction would not only be for the house but also for the land.

So, in our own way, we may have – or we may one day – do what Jesus says in the Gospel, “sell all you have and buy that field [or home / or house / or cottage].”  (Matthew 13:44)

For the right home, we would sell all we have – and then we would do all that we can – to protect our investment, make our home safe for visitors, for children.

[__03__]     In the Gospel, a man also sells all that he has.

We might notice that in this parable/metaphor of our Lord that Jesus speaks of a man finding treasure in a field.

But, with such a treasure we might immediately think of buying low and selling high… buy now, sell later at a big profit.

But, this is not the message…this man buys the field and holds on to the field.

[__04__]       That is, our Savior is reminding us that there are certain aspects of God’s kingdom, of God’s commands, of God’s ways for which we may have to sacrifice, to give up something.

We may not turn a profit … simply by being honest, by being fair.  We may not even turn an immediate profit by doing our jobs … honorably or honestly… or by studying hard in school.

Nevertheless, these are some the ways that we called to discover God’s kingdom, God’s buried treasure.

C.S. Lewis writes that decent behaviour does not mean the behaviour that pays and gives these examples of the “investment” are called to make by following God’s ways and selling all we have…

It means … “being content with three … when you might have got thirty… doing school work honestly when it would have been easy to cheat … staying in dangerous places when you would rather go somewhere safer, keeping promises you would rather not keep, and telling the truth even when it makes you look like a fool.”[1] (C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952), “Ch. 3 The Reality of the Law”, San Francisco: Harper Collins, 2001, p. 19)

In the short term, there may be little profit on our “investment.” 

[__05__]     So, in our lives as well, when we give ourselves to each other in marriage, in family life, in friendship, we are also buying a treasure, we are making a transaction.

Yet, this is not a transaction which will be closed by an attorney or banker nor will it give us the absolute right to gain whatever we want.

Rather, we are buying the field and surrendering to God’s ways and will – freely – so that we can care for the gifts which he has placed in our lives, on our property, in our possession.[__fin__]     

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[1] C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952), “Ch. 3 The Reality of the Law”, San Francisco: Harper Collins, 2001, p. 19.