Click here to read the daily readings from the USCCB website.
The verse before the Gospel today is, “Blessed are the poor in spirit; for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.” What an appropriate beatitude for today’s Gospel. “’This night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?’ Thus will it be for the one who stores up treasure for himself but is not rich in what matters to God.”
I don’t consider myself a miser, though I certainly try to be frugal and responsible. Even so, I know that this Gospel is for me. I might not store up treasure for myself in the monetary sense, but there are certainly other treasures that I seek before what matters to God. I’m absolutely a person who liked immediate gratification. I like doing what I want, when I want because it makes me feel good right now. So that often means I’ll put off prayer until later because I want to scroll Facebook right now. I’ll stay in bed a little longer and skip my morning prayer routine as I rush to get ready for the day. I’ll eat that dessert instead of denying myself for the sake of discipline. These might not be the first thing you think of when you think of storing up treasures for yourself, but I believe they still are. Listen to Paul’s words in the first reading, “All of us once lived among them in the desires of the flesh, following the wishes of the flesh and the impulses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like the rest.”
The things that make us rich in what matters to God are the things that make us smaller and make Him bigger. Whenever we make a sacrifice, we’re storing up treasures in heaven. Paul tells us, “We are His handiwork, created in Christ Jesus for good works that God has prepared in advance, that we should live in them.” The good works that God has prepared for us will pay infinite dividends for us eventually, but these treasures will seem to cost us in the here and now. They place God and neighbor before ourselves.
-Amanda Benner, Director of Evangelization