What did he say? We're supposed to do what?

Homily for the Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B
Numbers 11.25-29 Psalm 19 James 5.1-6 Mark 9.38-48

If we really took what Jesus says literally, then this church would be filled with people without hands, without feet, without eyes, and with millstones tied around their necks. Because the fact is that we all sin, we sin with our hands, stealing what belongs to others; we sin with our feet, walking away from an unjust situation without doing anything; we sin with our eyes, looking to see how we can use another person for our own pleasure; and we lead other people to sin by the way we live and act. Not one is immune from sin. And yet, we don’t take Jesus at his word, we don’t practice self-mutilation in order to get rid of those parts of our bodies that sin. And thank goodness we don’t. Because it really wouldn’t do any good. If we cut off a hand because it is causing us to sin, then we will very easily find another way to sin. Besides, it’s not really the foot or the hand or the eye that causes us to sin. Sin is a choice, a decision of the mind and the will; our limbs and organs do not act on their own. A hand does not cause us to steal; a deliberate choice of the will causes us to steal, our fallen human nature causes us to steal, our disordered priorities and habits cause us to steal. Self-mutilation is a pointless, ineffective solution to the problem of sin. So why does Jesus suggest it?

It seems to me that Jesus is trying to get us to get to the heart of what really causes sin and, on the other hand, what causes us to do good. Sin comes from us, not from God. The goal of a Christian life is to sin less and to become holy. In other words, the goal of a Christian life is to become less human and more like God. Of course, we’ll never get there in this life. But we can make progress. We can train ourselves through prayer, discipline, and hard work to become more and more open to God’s grace working in us. We can learn how to sin less and do more good, with God’s help. As soon as we rely too much on our own hands and eyes and feet to do the work of the gospel, then we will fail. It is only through God’s grace that we can be like Christ, it is not through any part of our fallen humanity.

So don’t cut off your hand or your foot or pluck out your eye – at least not literally. They may be instruments of sin, but they can also be instruments of grace. Instead, cut off your dependence on your humanity, your own effort, to do good. If we rely instead on God, he will use those same parts of our body to see injustice and work to end it, to serve others with our hands, our feet, and our hearts, to cooperate with him in building his kingdom.