30th Sunday Ordinary Time – Love God with divided souls & minds…

Battered hearts, fearful souls, and prideful minds.  Yep, back to that again.  So, take these connections Matthew makes to psyche, “soul, life,” as the divine Ink Blot test, the Rorschach Jesus puts out there for our reactions.  How do you like his ideals?

Matthew 6:25            “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

Matthew 10:37–39             Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me.  Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.

Matthew 16:24–26             Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.  For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?

Just a thought:  Don’t worry*%@^!  You have got to be kidding!  I’m just trying to keep it together.  Lose my life!  I’m losing my mind!   Speaking of mind, dianoia, is translated both “mind” and “heart.”

Genesis 8:21              And when the Lord smelled the pleasing odor, the Lord said in his heart, “I will never again curse the ground because of humankind, for the inclination of the human heart [mind!] is evil from youth; nor will I ever again destroy every living creature as I have done.

Isaiah 14:12–14              How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low!  You said in your heart, “I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit on the mount of assembly on the heights of Zaphon; I will ascend to the tops of the clouds, I will make myself like the Most High.”

Baruch 1:21f              We did not listen to the voice of the Lord our God in all the words of the prophets whom he sent to us, but all of us followed the intent of our own wicked hearts by serving other gods and doing what is evil in the sight of the Lord our God.

Question is: How the heck DO we love God with divided hearts, fearfully resistant souls, and self-serving minds? 

Seems to me that the first step is awareness of our setting in life.  Other ideas?