What Comes From the Heart

Wednesday of the 5^th Week in Ordinary Time

1 Kings 10:1-10; Mark 7:14-23

In today’s first reading, we see Israel under Solomon prospering as it never has before, and may never again. The great king’s wisdom, the food, his ministers, the burnt offerings, all the way down to how the servants and waiters were dressed, so impressed the visiting Queen of Sheba that she was left breathless. Still, when she found herself able to speak, to Whom did she give the highest praise? Almighty God: Blessed be the LORD, your God, whom it has pleased to place you on the throne of Israel. In his enduring love for Israel, the LORD has made you king to carry out judgment and justice (1 Kings 10:9). That’s true wisdom; she looked at them and saw God.

This reading is an excellent corrective for anyone who thinks they cannot bring people to Christ because that means dazzling them with our knowledge, inspiring them with our wisdom, or overwhelming them with the beauty, majesty, and riches of the Church. It doesn’t. Not that those things aren’t important, they are; God wants us to grow in knowledge of Him, longs to share His infinite wisdom with us, and is happy when we take pride in the glory and splendor of His holy Church. But, as Christ said in the gospel, what matters most isn’t what goes in the mind, but what comes from the heart.

As I’ve said before, the greatest evangelizers in my life are people who have never spoken to me about theology, never tried to impress me with their wisdom, and never given me history lessons about Christ or His Church. Not that they couldn’t; at least one of them knows it all much better than I do! Rather, what has spoken volumes and ignited my faith is what has come from their hearts; Christ is so integrated into who they are and how they live that you can’t see the one without the other. These are men and women who have taught me, without knowing it, that my faith didn’t come from them; it came from God working through them, and, to mean anything, has to be lived in the world, and not just talked about. Ralph Waldo Emerson said it best, and may it be said of all Christians: “Your actions speak so loudly, I can not hear what you are saying.”