It’s not true that there’s nothing we can do. There are all kinds of things we can do. The situation isn’t hopeless. All is not lost.
We can change the world, we can save it, if only we do what Jesus tells us to do. He lays it all out. It’s all there, right in front of us.
If you bring your gift to the altar, and there recall that your brother or sister has anything against you, leave your gift there at the altar, go first and be reconciled with your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.
If you right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away.
If you right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away.
Let your Yes mean Yes and your No mean No.
When someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other one to him as well. If anyone wants to go to law with you over your tunic, hand him you cloak as well. Should anyone press you into service for one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who asks of you and not turn your back on one who wants to borrow.
Be not afraid.
What I’m tracking here are the many commands Jesus gives us. I mean their syntax, their structure.
Sentences can be declarative: We are walking down the road. Sentences can be interrogative: Who is that walking down the road? And then there are these kinds of sentences, the imperative, the direct commands.
Judge not.
Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
When you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, who love to stand and pray so that others may see them, but when you pray, go to your inner room.
Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, but store up treasure in heaven.
Do not worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will take care of itself.
Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Look at the birds of the air. Learn from the way the wild flowers grow.
Sell all you have and give to the poor.
Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep.
Jesus is radically specific and radically open-ended, both very clear and maddeningly elusive. Sometimes he’s concrete, directing us to act in certain ways towards others, and yet most of his commands have to do with our interior states, our attitudes, our dispositions.
In a way what’s most remarkable are the things Jesus doesn’t tell us to do. He never tells us to look out for number one. He never commands us to ignore the poor and exclude the stranger. He never orders us to make a lot of money.
His commands are never about governments or programs. That’s not where their faith lies.
In the end they all become parables: they leave us in “sufficient doubt” about how we should apply them that they “tease us into thought.”
Into whatever house you enter, first say, Peace to this household. If a peaceful person lives there, your peace will rest on him; but if not, it will return to you.
Whatever town you enter, and they welcome you, eat what is set before you, cure the sick in it and say to them, the Kingdom of God is at hand for you.
Whoever will not receive you or listen to your words, go outside that house or town and shake the dust from your feet.
Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto to God what is God’s.
When you hear of wars and reports of wars, do not be alarmed.
Do not fear those who can kill the body but cannot kill the soul.
Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving but believe.
Take this and eat, for this is my body.
Take this and drink, for this is my blood.
Do this in memory of me.
There are all kinds of people out there telling us what to do and how to do it. They’re very specific. They’re confident. They have all the answers. There are all kinds of voices in our heads telling us that we have to be anxious, we have to be afraid, we have to shout and fight.
But the commands of Jesus are the commands of the heart. The commands of Jesus plunge us deeper into the ordinariness and the mystery of the way things really are.
The commands of Jesus draw us closer and closer to him, to the mystery of the God who loves us and suffers with us and is with us always, even unto the end of time.
When you’re worried about what you can do, when you feel hopeless, when you’re afraid, remember what Mary says to the waiters at the Wedding in Cana: do whatever he tells you.
Take nothing for the journey, neither walking stick, nor sack, nor food, nor money.
Take courage. Be not afraid.
Put out to deep water and let down your nets.
Listen, there is only one thing necessary: Love one another as I have loved you.
There is only one great commandment: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your mind and all your soul, and your neighbor as yourself.
He told us these things, plain as day.
Come, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.
Come, have breakfast.
Come down from that tree.
Come, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world.