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The Immediate or the Eternal?
The 11th Sunday of Luke (14:16-24)
December 16, 2001

The verse that introduces the parable that makes up our gospel reading today is not actually included in the reading itself. After Jesus had been speaking, a man sitting at the table with him said: "Blessed is he who shall eat bread in the kingdom of God."

This parable is Jesus' response to that statement. Particularly regarding his Jewish listeners, his point is that no one is interested in the invitation to God's kingdom. The final statement of the master in the parable makes that clear: "None of those invited shall taste of my supper."

No one was interested . . . Why? There are many reasons one might propose. But one thing that comes through very clearly is that they were focused on immediate concerns. Whether it was business or personal, each of the three invitees was wrapped up with matters of immediate significance and could not be interested in the dinner invitation. This fact ought to capture our attention because we live in a culture that lays particular emphasis on the immediate and has little patience for the long-term and protracted.

We all know the difference between "immediate gratification" and "long-term fulfillment." Immediate gratification is "right here, right now," involving little investment and little effort: Examples would be "one night stands," winning the lottery, getting high on drugs, buying on credit, and generally doing what you feel like doing.

Long-term fulfillment is found in a lifetime of marriage, the deep peace born of disciplined prayer, building a successful business from the ground up, raising your children well, and developing a virtuous character.

This culture tends to emphasize the immediate. One way is by focusing on pleasure. One reason for this is that our capitalistic system relies consumer purchasing and thus advertises encourages people to "buy now!" to achieve gratification. Long-term goals and fulfillment are not rejected, but they tend to get lost in the PR shuffle - so that the conscious attitude of many people tends to gravitate toward the immediate.

What's the message? Life should be fun. Pleasure is the most important thing in life. Indulging your desires is the key to a happy life. Of course, the truth is that the unrestrained indulgence of your desires is the key to becoming a shallow, jaded, frustrated, and unfulfilled person.

Thrills do not build character. Self-indulgence does not breed virtue. A focus on short-lived pleasures does not generate a noble spirit. Pleasure does not give contentment.

Another example of how our modern culture tends to promote a fixation on the immediate is by de-emphasizing history.

This is a fruit of naïve and silly attitudes that were prevalent in the youth culture of the late 1960's: "This is an entirely new world and we can remake it any way we want. We are more enlightened than previous generations. The here and now is the only thing that counts."

Unfortunately, those attitudes have prevailed to the point where the vast majority of Americans today are historically and geographically illiterate - to the peril of both our national character and institutions. Of course, in such a situation, the old axiom eventually proves true: "Those who refuse to learn the lessons of history are condemned to repeat it."

But beyond that, the more troubling trend is the unquestioning tendency to narrow the range of human experience to our own, and neglect the vast treasure-house of the accumulated wisdom of the centuries.

This is why tradition is so critical; without it we fall prey to becoming mere creatures of the customs, trends, and habits of our own time - in other words, slaves of the immediate.

(This is why, by the way, we Orthodox don't simply pick up a bible and read it in terms of what it seems to mean to us, but we always read it in the light of the Fathers and saints who have gone before us).

I could go on with other examples from our modern culture, but suffice it to say that preoccupation with the immediate can never address the most fundamental aspects of what it means to be a human being.

We all start at the same point: we pass from the womb of our mother and face the world. At the far horizon lies the banquet table of the eternal kingdom of God. In between the two stands Christ, who assures that he is the way and invites to attain that glorious inheritance the Father has provided for us.

But it is a long range project; it requires that we keep our eye trained and our wills set on that distant goal. This life is a moral and spiritual journey meant to clothe us in Christ and render us worthy to inherit God's kingdom.

The character that we form here on the pathway of life is the garment we will wear to the festal table of the Lord. The person that we become here is the person that will seek admission to the heavenly banquet hall. The virtues that typify us in this life will be the measure of whether Christ recognizes himself in us and calls us to enter his kingdom.

To allow ourselves to be distracted by the immediate and lose sight of what we are called to be in Christ is a potential disaster lurking in the shadows for all of us. As Jesus warned us, the "cares, riches, and pleasures of life" will choke us, and we will "bring no fruit to maturity." We will not complete the journey of having our personhood formed in the image of Christ.

So let us not be seduced by the tyranny of immediate concerns into neglecting what is of eternal value. Let us fear, lest we, like those in our gospel today, disdain the gracious invitation of the One who created us to feast with him forever.

Indeed, as the book of Hebrews tells us,
"Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith . . . for here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come" (Heb. 12:1-2a; 13:14).

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