What Would You Ask For

It’s Sunday which means it’s time for Reflections on the Mass Readings! Today’s readings are brought to you by God, and they are 1 Kings 3:5, 7 – 12, Romans 8:28 -30 and Matthew 13: 44-52.

What would you ask for? If God came to you and said “I will give you anything you want, no strings attached?” what would you ask Him for? Would it be for riches, fame, health, to be a winning professional golfer? In the first reading this is what God asked of Solomon.

“The LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream at night. God said, ‘Ask something of me and I will give it to you.’”

Solomon could have asked for anything, but all he asked for was wisdom. He was looking for the wisdom to be able to govern God’s people, to judge them fairly, knowing the difference between right and wrong. How many of us would ask for this today? I am willing to guess probably not many. Yes, I know I am cynical, but I believe that so many of us have been living in a world full of materialism, individualism, hedonism and minimalism that we would think of “things” first, not wisdom. As I have said before in this blog, we no longer distinguish between right and wrong, I fear we may no longer know the difference.

Elsewhere in Matthew we are told:

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal. But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.” – Matthew 6:19 – 21

Yet most of us would still ask for treasure, for things,believing they would make us happy. Since finding my way back to God, (I know you get sick of me telling you that) I have truly come to realize that “things” are not the most important things in life. There have been times when I have had nothing, and I thought things could get no worse. Yet, I got by, something always would happen to get me out of the hole I was in. That thing was Jesus. As the passage from the top of this blog says, God won’t let us fall so far we can’t get back up.

We spend all out time gathering things, things that we can’t take with us when we go. I don’t remember where I heard this saying, but it goes: “I have never seen a hearse pulling a U-Haul trailer.” I often think if I had read the Word of God when I was a lot younger, I would not have made the mistakes I did. There are some passages especially which I wish I had learned, studied and understood. The whole of Matthew, Chapter 6, being one of them. I spent a good part of my life, pursuing “things”, trying to gather treasures here on earth, instead of trying to gather treasures I could store in heaven. Because of this, I wasted much of my life, not taking the time I needed for my wife and family. It was always work, work, work. We need this, we need that. And no matter what we had it was never enough.

Now, I realize there are things that are more important. Faith, love, hope, charity, family and friends just to name a few. In my case I have alienated my family and never had time to make true friends, but I am working on these and the others as well. and how did I get from Solomon asking for wisdom to this? Hmmm, I am not sure, sometimes I think the Lord just makes my bone weary fingers typr things.

Actually, there is a connection. I should have asked God for the same thing as Solomon did, for Wisdom, to know right from wrong, to know what is good, and what is important. Not that God ever asked me what I wanted, but I could have done this through prayer, as I have been doing for the last few years. I truly believe this would have made my life different. But, then, maybe I had to go through all I have to get to where I am now, closer to God.

After all, God does have a plan for all of us.