Let the Master Keep the House.
“For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
My Friend,
The Lord is calling you this day.
The world is ravaged by a tornado which carves through our dew-laden pastures. The devil’s alluring whispers are harsh winds which rip the bluegrass and clover from the soil, scatter the livestock, and tear barnhouses from their foundations, thus reducing still forage and charming shelters into debris.
Your heart is one of these houses for the Lord. Tell me, when a house is unkept, does it clean itself? Only the master of the house is responsible for tidying the kitchen, sweeping the floors, setting the beds, and decorating it as he chooses.
Do not be what you are not. Surrender yourself to the Lord. Allow Him to keep the house. He shall glorify the temple.
The winds brush your ear. They sound to take care of yourself, that you are alone, that you are both housekeeper and house. Do not be uprooted. The storm is noise. God did not make you to be debris.
Lose yourself to the Lord. He will set you free from the anxieties in your life. Give no attention to the scratch on your car, worry not for the direction of your career, erase the image in the mirror; see how unhindered you can be in giving.
Why do you force yourself to tidy? Do you prefer to pick up the broom? See, as you give yourself up, how the sheets are tucked, and the ornaments bring more delight. Protest if you would like, but you will struggle, and you cause the Master of the house to grieve at its being disheveled.
Do not be what you are not. The Master knows of each creak in the floorboards, but the house is unaware that its pillars are rotting. Do not lock the Master out, or keep Him waiting in the foyer, but provide Him the key to walk in the front door and browse the house in its entirety.
I am reminded of the invitation we plead at the Mass before each communion: “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word, and my soul shall be healed.” We invite the Lord into our hearts so that He will keep us and renew the dew of our morning pastures. He delights in us and our request. We acknowledge the Truth that He is Master and we are His dwelling place. To live otherwise is to live a lie.
“Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb,” the priest announces before our aforementioned invitation. Indeed, we are. For to be called in communion with Him, to partake in His body given for us, that is to be free. It is the divine presence in our mortal world. No feat are we able to accomplish outside material means but by Him; therefore, no feat are we capable of that shall surpass what we are capable of with Him.
Our lives here are constrained. To be physical is to decay, to rot. But the soul is not made for rot. It is made to conform to Him who is of Heaven: the Truth, Love itself, He who is with us, knows us, works for us, cares for us; He lives in us so we may live in Him. We ought not be burdened by the world, nor anxious of the self, but live for others, give to others; allow for them to drink from us, who are made into His founts on earth.
To be focused on the self, that is humanity's plague. Think of the time spent on self-management, money spent on self-preservation, focus given to self-aggrandizement. Hours dedicated to beauty and gym routines, dollars to fancy sports cars and spa treatments, energy exhausted seeking social media praise and vain accolades. What need is there for self-justification when the Master has already chosen the house? When He has replaced the rotten pillars and creaky floorboards with those which are polished and sturdy? The only pitfall we have is to lock out the Master from our hearts.
How much more would we be full in community with one another if we faced one another? Hours dedicated to sharing meals and dances— dollars spent on the needy, or even to provide unnecessary joys to a neighbor— energy gained from the smiles of a neighbor and the laughter of good news? How much more would we be satisfied in giving than in storing?
“Do not store up treasures for yourselves on earth, where they will be destroyed by moth and rust and where thieves break in and steal. Rather, store up treasure for yourselves in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves cannot break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart also be.” - Matthew 6:19-21
Our Blessed Lord plainly tells us these truths, yet our hearts refuse to listen. We go by the tornado’s discordant winds rather than the Water’s gentle trickles. The house will be tended to if the Master is allowed in.
Here, too, we see where the Master keeps His treasure. For it is not by our world that our hearts can store what is in Heaven, but only by giving the key to Him who is of Heaven. Allow Him to move in His Spirit, and the house will be filled with His purity and ideals.
Now think if we truly obeyed this, and recognized as marigolds do, that turning towards the Light would give us more full satisfaction and bring out the most vibrant of our colors. Lives lived acknowledging the Spirit sent down to us. Roald Dahl expresses this idea best: “If you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.” If we are filled with the Spirit, if we allow the Master to decorate His temple, we shall shine greatly by partaking in His glory. Our presence to one another will radiate His divine light, and we shall illumine the disheveled temples around us, for where His light shines, there, too, does His life flow.
The Lord is living water. He created you to be a fountain that He may flow through into this world. The fountain is built to withstand the storm. It is meant to flow outwards. When we allow ourselves to be as created, He rests in us peacefully, flowing steadily, and our purpose is fulfilled. He fulfills His by permeating the world, nourishing it and providing its innermost vitality.
Remember our Lord’s response to the thirsting Samaritan woman: “…Whoever drinks the water that I will give him will never be thirsty. The water that I will give him will become a spring of water within him welling up to eternal life.” The Lord gives His life so we may draw from Him, and give it back again. We are not His reservoir, for the fountain does not imbibe what it sprouts, but His spring which stretches its streams to those who thirst.
To partake in Him, to allow Him to be our Master, is to be grounded — rooted so firmly that no wind shall rip us from the soil. The discordance and destruction of the tornado may tear through the pasture, yet when the flock returns with the sun, each blade of His grass shall be refreshed with morning dew, and the Master shall emerge from His house, pail in hand, ready to tend the fields.
