Word to the Wise
Sunday, June 22, 2008 - Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time
[Jeremiah 20:10-13; Romans 5:12-15; Matthew 10:26-33]Are not two sparrows sold for a small coin? Yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father's knowledge. Even all the hairs of your head are counted. So do not be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.
One of the big political and legal issues of our day concerns privacy and security! Since the event we call 9/11, the government has sought more and more to "listen in" on the lives of others! Even if the reasons are piously given that this is part of an effort to maintain national security, do we in fact feel more secure knowing that our own communications could be monitored in the interests of national security? It seems to me that most of us would feel a bit uneasy about that. Our individualistic culture prizes privacy as a sacred right! Much of that privacy is "secured" by codes and gates and passwords, etc.etc. What then are we to make of Jesus' statements about God's providence? Can we tolerate the kind of intimate knowledge that God has of us? Jesus points out that God is involved in the lives of even the smallest of creatures. The sparrow becomes a symbol of this. I don't think the sparrows I feed every day outside my house have any notion of my being an instrument of God's providence, but they are reminders to me of that divine presence. Perhaps it has become easier over the years for God to count the number of hairs on my head, but Jesus' statement does remind me that even the smallest part of my person is a subject of divine providence. Is this a violation of my privacy? Is it an unwarranted intrusion? My thoughts are not always high, holy and lofty! Shouldn't it make me uneasy that they are completely known to God? Since the level of privacy we cherish so much was (and still is) virtually unknown in the culture in which Jesus lived, his words are meant to be a consolation to those who worried about persecution for the sake of the kingdom. He seeks to assure everyone that they are important in the sight of God and that God will not forget them. In our own time, Jesus' words may be a challenge to the material and psychological walls we American individualists build up around ourselves in the name of privacy and security - as if we could even keep God at arm's length. The power of providence is not meant to be crushing or intimidating. It is meant to be reassuring. The old hymn says it well: "His eye is on the sparrow. And I know he watches me." AMEN
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