28th Sunday of Ordinary Time (2024)

A long, long time ago, on a late afternoon, in a beautiful cathedral in Europe, an elderly man sat at the organ — playing.  

He was a skilled musician. But this day, his music was sad and melancholy — because this was his last day.  He was being replaced by a younger organist. 

As the sun was begging to set, the back door of the church opened, and a rather brusque young man strode into the cathedral. The elderly musician recognized his successor — rose from the bench — removed the key from the organ — and headed toward the door. 

The younger musician approached the older one, he held out his hand and, without any preliminaries, said, "Please. The key.”

The older man hesitated — but then, reluctantly — dropped the key into his hand. 

The young man literally ran to the organ.  He sat down on the bench, looked at the organ, inserted the key and began to play. 

While the older man had played beautifully and skillfully — the young man played with sheer genius. Music filled the cathedral — it filled the village — it filled the countryside.  Music such as they had never heard before!

This was the world's introduction to the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. 

The elderly man, with tears in his eyes, said softly to himself, “Suppose — I had not given the master the key!”

I have a lot of sympathy for the older man.I think it’s our nature to hold tightly on to things that bring us comfort, security, and identity — our plans, possessions, relationships, and even our personal ambitions. 

However, the act of holding on too tightly can lead to anxiety, fear, and a false sense of control. Certainty is a cruel imposter. A person can accumulate millions of dollars and still lose it in a recession.  A health-conscious person can eat only organically grown whole-grain cereals and veggies and still battle cancer.  A recluse can avoid all human contact and still struggle with insomnia.  

We want certainty — but the only certainty is the lack thereof.

That’s why the most stressed-out people are the control freaks – they fail at the quest they most pursue.  

And we are all — in some fashion — control freaks.The more we try to control our world — the more we realize we cannot.  

Life becomes a cycle of anxiety; failure; anxiety; failure; anxiety; failure.  We can’t take control – because control is not ours to take.

The Bible has a better idea.Rather than seeking control — relinquish it.

You and I cannot run the world — but we can entrust it to God. True peace and freedom come from surrendering these to God.

This weekend, we begin a new message series that Fr. John and I are calling “Confessions of a Control Freak.”

We’re going to examine what it is that God maybe calling us to give up control of. 

It’s not always easy to recognize in ourselves what it is we are trying to control – until someone or something touches on it – and our knuckles turn white clinging tighter.

To use for an example — The Rich Young Man from the Gospel reading today.  It is an encounter with Jesus that always leaves me uncomfortable.“Go, sell what you have…”

We might conclude that today’s story is about wealth. 

It does tell us that the man went away sad because he had many possessions. But it’s not really about money or possessions – It’s about love and trust.

The love is amply testified to in the story. 

We can see it in the enthusiasm of the rich man as he runs up to Jesus and kneels down before him. We can see it in his honest desire to find eternal life and his belief that Jesus can show him the way. 

We can see it in his goodness as he shares with Jesus that he has kept all of God’s commandments since his youth. Jesus, too, sees this man’s goodness and he loves him. There is every reason to believe that the man knew that Jesus loved him. 

But the tragedy of the story is that the man did not believe enough in that love. He did not believe enough in Jesus’ love to trust him.

Jesus asks him to give up all of his possessions and that is something that the man cannot do. But his failure to do so was not a failure of generosity, as it was a failure of trust. 

He should have been able to trust that if Jesus was asking him to let go of what he had, it was only because Jesus was going to give him something better.

His possessions were good things — but Jesus wanted to give him more — “Then come follow me.” And because he could not trust Jesus, he walked away, holding on to the possessions that he had — leaving behind what could have been.

This story asks us to trust that when we must let go of good things in our life, God has not forgotten us.  

In fact, God is preparing to offer us another good thing. 

The ‘KEY’ the rich man needed to let go of was his possessions, his material wealth. 

Perhaps God is asking us to have a similar attitude.

Not necessarily financially.  There are a variety of things of which we could be asked to let go of. We could be asked to let go of a relationship — of a project — of a dream — of an ability. 

As we grow older, we may have to let go of some of our energy — our mobility — or some aspect of our health. All of these things are good things, but as life moves on there are times when we can no longer hold on to them. 

It is then we must let them go. It is then we need to trust that God has not forgotten us, and God will still bless us.

Fr. Richard Rohr crystallized this truth in a beautiful saying: “Sometimes the greatest obstacle to the next good thing that God wants to give us is the good thing we already possess.” 

We can become so possessive of what we already have, that we close ourselves off to what is yet to come.  We are called to make a different choice. 

We are called to support one another in the faith that when we must let go of any good thing, God is still with us. When we must let go of something we would rather hold on to, it is only so that we can make room for God to bless us again.

This week, I invite you to read this passage from Mark, Chapter 10.Reflect on it during your quiet time. Put yourself in the scene — imagine Jesus speaking to you.

What is the ‘KEY’ he is asking you to let go of that makes you want to turn away?He’s asking you to let it go — not because he wants something from you — but because he wants something for you.

Then suppose — just suppose — you hand the Master the key.