Psalm Reflection: The Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time - Cycle B

“You are my inheritance, O Lord!” - Psalms 16

My grandpa’s funeral was the first funeral I ever remember attending. I remember not knowing how to feel. I was certainly sad, but I remember seeing others crying and wondering why I wasn’t crying like they were. I was too young to understand loss. My grandparent’s house was where we gathered for every major holiday and celebration: Easter, Mother’s Day & Father’s Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and many others. My grandpa would occasionally read to me but always fell asleep before he could finish the book, but I loved that he always tried.

When my grandma passed away I was older, and the loss was more palpable. We had continued to gather for all the major holidays, and were there even more often to be with my grandma, but when she passed the house was sold and all the possessions and estate were divided amongst the family.

All of us grandchildren were there to help go through the house and clean it out. We were told we could keep anything we wanted if we asked. I walked away with my grandpa’s Swiss army knife, playing cards, and uniform from his time in the navy, and a glass goblet my grandma used to always have filled with candy when we visited.

In one sense, that was my share of the inheritance. The problem with what I took is that these things sit in my house and do nothing. These items are tucked away in drawers and closets or sitting on shelves, adding nothing tangible to my life. They remind me of my grandparents, who I loved, but they do not affect my day to day life.

The Psalm this Sunday invites us to proclaim, “You are my inheritance, O Lord!” I feel like many of us treat that inheritance like items on a shelf. Sometimes we look at them, they give us warm, fuzzy thoughts about those we love, but we do not bring them out into our everyday life.

God does not want to be a piece of your life, ticked away in a convenient “Church” compartment that you open and use when you need something or want to feel the warm fuzzies. Jesus wants to transform your heart so that you will be free of the power of sin and live a new life in union with Him forever.

The real inheritance of my grandparents is how they shaped the person I am. I am a living inheritance of them in how I allow them to live on in me. I carry my memories with them and their advice with me, and they shape the person I am every single day. That is what the Lord is inviting us into: a daily lived relationship with Him that changes who we are for the better. If I were to lose the items I took home from my grandparents house, their true inheritance would live on in me.

If everything else in your life fell apart, would Jesus be enough of an inheritance for you?

Is He enough and do you trust that He will make all things new?

Following Jesus is not about what we get to take home for ourselves. It is about how Christ transforms us into people that can go transform the world for the better. In order for that to happen, I need to be willing to let go of all the other stuff that might get in the way. If I inherited several thousand dollars, that could end up being so attractive to me that I neglect to realize what my grandparents really gave me: their love, their time, and their wisdom.

What in your life is holding you back from receiving your true inheritance?

Have you treated religion in a way that has made it into an obstacle instead of a source of grace?

How has the Lord transformed your life?

What more do you think He desires to do in you and through you?

How do you carry the Lord with you wherever you go? What does that look like?

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus teaches us that earthly treasures are temporary, they are all spent or waste away, and that we must work toward strong up treasures in Heaven:

“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

What attachments are standing in the way of you living into your divine inheritance? Take some time this week to reflect on what Jesus has done in your life, and what is standing in the way of Him doing more. Is it time, pride, sin, pain, loss, suffering, worry, anxiety, doubt, fear, loneliness, despair, anger, confusion, or scrupulosity? Put those on the shelf, let them waste away, and trust that God’s grace and mercy are bigger than all of them. Do not waste one more minute of one more day not living the transformative life Jesus won for you on the cross.

I am praying for you, please pray for me, and I will see you in the Eucharist.

Matt

This reflection is based on the Responsorial Psalm for this Sunday, November 17th, 2024, the Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time - Cycle B: Psalms 16:5, 8, 9-10, 11.