Outside the Comfort Zone (continued)

If we are going to fulfill the commandment  to love one another , then we are going to have to step outside of our comfort zone. Jesus did it. The ultimate example of stepping outside your comfort zone must be the Incarnation, when God lay aside glory and took on human nature.

If I say this in front of children, I like to ask them: “Would you change places? Would you be willing to become a cockroach?” “Oh, no!” But the distance between us and a cockroach is miniscule compared to the distance between us and the almighty God.

One of the things that Pope Francis has encouraged, at least informally, is be willing to go out and risk. It is okay if you make a mistake. He wants the shepherds and evangelizers to smell like the sheep. We do not smell that way if we are separated from them. Get out there. Bring the gospel. The motivation for doing that is that our God came to be with us. Every time we celebrate the eucharist, we are reminded of how much God was willing to empty himself.

There is a beautiful line in the opening chapter of the Gospel of John. We often translate it this way: “In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

If we go back to the Greek, it actually says, “The Word became flesh and  pitched his tent among us.” I would love to find that translation used. “He pitched his tent.” It may not mean much to us in our day and culture, but to our ancestors, it certainly would because they would remember that pitching a tent was what they did when God led them out of the slavery of Egypt until they wandered into the Promised Land. For 40 years they wandered in the wilderness, trying to find their way.

Throughout it all their God was in the midst of them. They erected a tent where the ark of the covenant was placed. They thought of God being there, that this tabernacle was his dwelling place, and when they moved on they struck that tent and continued on until they set it up again wherever they would stop. It was a constant reminder that God was with them on this journey. When we say that “he pitched his tent among us,” we are encouraged to hold onto the conviction that he has promised to be with each one of us in the journey that we take. You know as well as I that if you are on a journey with God, you are not going to be able to stay where you are very long.

That is one of the characteristics of a Catholic Christian spiritual life—the acknowledgment that God will let you rest in an oasis for a little while, but he is always saying “Let’s go.” When the disciples came to him and said, “Where do you stay?” He didn’t tell them. He said, “Come and see.” It is meant to be an adventure.

Pope Francis likes to say, “Be open to the God of surprises, the God who enters into the life of the church at large and into the life of individual persons. I have to believe that you have had that experience, that several times you found yourself doing things and saying later, “I never thought I would be doing this.”

That is the response to the God of surprises. That is the call to step outside your comfort zone. Jesus not only taught it in word, he showed us an example, did he not? For example, Jesus was confronted by a leper. Had Jesus touched him, he would have been rendered impure. The lepers were told to cry out, “Unclean, unclean.” But the New Testament says that Jesus touched him. Jesus was willing to risk the impurity of the law for the sake of doing what his Father wanted—to reach out and to love.

At times, I understand the statement of Lucy Van Pelt (Charlie Brown’s friend): “I love humanity. It’s people I can’t stand.”

To be in the world or to be in a community means you are rubbing shoulders day in and day out with differing people, with differing ideas and differing temperaments, and you have to struggle with that. There is always a reason to close the door. And indeed, a spiritual life is going to have to have times to do as Jesus did when he went off to the mountain to be alone and to pray. You have to have those times in which you are energized. The energizing is to open one up to go back again.

That is the whole purpose of our repeatedly coming to the liturgy we call the eucharist. We have an extraordinary nickname for it—we call it the “Mass.” And what does “Mass” mean? It means “dismissal.” We come every Sunday morning—some of us more frequently than that—to celebrate the eucharist so that we can be sent out into the world again. “Go back out there. You are not finished yet. I’ve got something else for you to do.”