There are three things that last, and the greatest of these is love
Do we allow the word of God we hear often - for some, daily - to affect our lives, or are we like the those of Jesus' generation whom he describes in today's gospel reading, who are good at explaining away anything that would change their status-quo, to go on living as it suits them? That is a personal question to answer, a personal topic for reflection in the light of each one's experience
In today's first reading Paul urges us to be ambitious for the higher gifts, and he then goes on to explain eloquently what love is. One line caught my attention: "if I give away all that I possess, piece by piece, and if I even let them take my body to burn it, but am without love, it will do me no good whatever." In other words, it is possible to do acts of love even to the point of martyrdom without having love, and not to profit at all by the sacrifice. That is frightening. How then can I be ambitious for this gift? How can I know I am on the right track, that I am loving and not just feeding my ego?
The answer is that love is exercised not so much in agendas we plan to carry out, as in being attentive to the daily and manifold opportunities God sends us to exercise all the adjectives descriptive of love which Paul names: patience, kindness, restraint from jealousy or conceit, from rudeness and selfishness, from taking offence and from resentfulness; refraining from taking pleasure in others' sins, delighting in the truth; readiness to excuse, to hope and to endure. There is a parable of an unknown author named "At the Water's Edge" which expresses this beautifully. I quote part of it: "...sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our lives. If we were allowed to go through our lives without any obstacles, it would cripple us... I asked for strength, but I was given difficulties to make me strong. I asked for wisdom, but I was given problems to solve. I asked for prosperity, but I was given brain and brawn to work. I asked for courage, but I was given danger to overcome. I asked for love, but I was given troubled people to help... I received nothing I wanted, I received everything I needed.”
