Because I Can !!!!!

1 Cor 8:8-9:2

“Because I can” How many times have we heard these words, as an excuse for any kind of behavior? Or how many times have we said these words, ourselves? People often choose to do something, not because it has a purpose or out of necessity, but simply because they can.  When faced with baffling behavior, usually selfish & prideful in nature, from some other person or some group of people or ourselves, this rational often comes up: “Why do people do anything? Because they can.”  How much “bad behavior” in society or even, heaven forbid, in the Church, is linked to this mindset – to do something simply because “I want to”?  And when the wisdom of a certain behavior is questioned, or even a useful purpose is sought, then that questioning becomes a challenge to one’s rights – evoking an even greater motivation, to do something “because I can,” simply to demonstrate one’s “right” to pursue selfish & prideful conduct.  This is the ultimate expression of what we often assume to be “freedom”; the ability to do anything simply “because I can” with no other justification or purpose. 

But this is not what we heard today, in the epistle.  The Holy Apostle Paul writes to the Christians in the city of Corinth, “Take heed lest by any means this liberty of yours become a stumbling-block to them that are weak. … Wherefore if meat (i.e. anything I “can do”) causes my brother offense, I will eat no flesh (i.e. abstain from what I “can do”) while the world stands.”  Here is a different motivation for choosing what we will do.  Simply because I “can do” something or have the right to do it, does not make it a good choice.  “Because I can” operates out of the principle of self-centeredness, however, the Gospel teaches us to deny ourselves, to set aside our own lives, and instead act out of love for our neighbor, to work in their best interest rather than out of the simple fulfillment of one’s own desires.

This distinction goes right to the basic core of the difference between the life in the world and the life in the Kingdom of God.  Those who follow the world, act out of self-fulfillment and self-interest, insisting on their “rights” and “privileges”. 

Those who follow Christ, on the other hand, strive to set aside themselves, as did our Lord, and to sacrifice our own desires, our own rights and our own privileges, as He did. 

Our Lord Jesus Christ is God incarnate; He is the Creator of all that is.  If anyone would have the right to do something, “because I can,” it would be Him.  Instead, He came to us and sacrificed His rights and privileges, being born in a cave rather than a palace, fleeing for His life as an infant, rather than destroying those who threatened Him.  He submitted Himself to His mother and His earthly father, obeying them without question.  As a man, He lived a nomadic life as a wandering rabbi, having neither home nor family. 

He voluntarily submitted to an unjust arrest, a mock trial, beatings, and finally, a shameful death on a cross.  He, who is, the ruler of the world, set aside all of His rights and privileges, and sacrificed Himself, for us.  If we would follow Him, then this is the example that we must take – to sacrifice ourselves, our rights, our desires, even our lives for our neighbor or even our church family, to be careful not to offend even one of our brothers or sisters with our selfishness, or self-proclaimed knowledge.

Today, we also call to mind the Great Judgement, that moment, at the end of the world, when we all, will stand before our Creator, this same Lord Jesus Christ, and this time face His judgment.  How will He judge us?  He will He look to see if we have taken to heart, what He has shown us, demonstrated to us, in His life.  He will look to see if we have sacrificed ourselves for our neighbor, or, if we have insisted on our rights, and fulfilling our own selfish desires, with no regard for our neighbor.  Did we follow the path that He showed us, or have we chosen instead, to follow the path of self-gratification and self-satisfaction. Have we offended our neighbor, or, have we had compassion upon him?  Do we forgive others and treat them gently, or do we ignore them?  Did we chase our brothers and sisters from His Church, thus from Salvation, because we thought we knew better?

This is how we will be judged; have we become like Christ?

How is it that we can live such a life?  We were created to look to God and His provision for our every need, indeed for our own very life.  But in our sin, we turned away from that life and began to try and provide for ourselves.  We live in a fallen world, where our “natural” reaction, is to take what we need, when we can, and to defend it from every threat. 

We must provide for ourselves because no one else will provide for us.  This is the nature of the fall.  But when we come to a life in Christ, we have to overcome that fallen “natural” character of self-reliance and self-knowledge, and to put all our hope on God, and to look again, as we were created to do, to God and His provision for our every need, even life itself.

In the coming weeks, we enter into a period which is given to us as a remembrance of paradise.  We begin to eat a diet similar to that of our first parents before the fall. Throughout these upcoming weeks, our celebration is not meant to be an over-indulgence of our fleshly desires, prior to the self-denial of Great Lent, but rather it is meant to call to mind the joys and bliss of the life in Paradise that we lost, because of our sin.  With this experience, we will then face the coming Sundays and weeks, when we recall and mourn the casting out, of our first parents from paradise which leads directly into the voluntarily suffering and repentance of Great Lent, in which, we mourn for our own sins, and repent and ask forgiveness. 

Today we set the stage for that understanding, for we remember that we are not meant to coddle our own desires, or to indulge ourselves, but rather we are placed on this earth that we might learn and live, to be like Christ — to sacrifice ourselves for our neighbor; to love others and to have compassion upon them; to be merciful and to forgive every sin and offense.  Such a life is a foretaste of paradise, of eternity in the Kingdom of God, and living in the presence of Him, illumined by the light of His Majesty. 

Christ is still King, Amen!!

Thanks Fr David