Hear It—and Do It
There are mornings when we already know what we ought to do.
That may be the most uncomfortable sort of morning.
We often imagine that the great difficulty of the Christian life is discovering God’s will. Sometimes it is. But quite often the problem is simpler: we have heard the word perfectly well. We merely have not done anything about it.
Today’s Gospel is only two verses long. A woman cries out from the crowd in admiration of Christ and of the mother who bore Him. Jesus does not reject her praise. He turns it toward its completion.
Blessedness is not merely recognizing holiness when we see it.
Blessedness is hearing the word of God—and keeping it.
Let us begin the morning there.
OPENING VERSE
Lord, open my lips.
And my mouth shall declare thy praise.
INVITATORY
Antiphon: Come, let us adore the Lord, for he made us.
Psalm 94 (95)
Come let us praise the Lord with joy: let us joyfully sing to God our saviour.
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving; and make a joyful noise to him with psalms.
For the Lord is a great God, and a great king above all gods.
For in his hand are all the ends of the earth: and the heights of the mountains are his.
For the sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land.
Come let us adore and fall down: and weep before the Lord that made us.
For he is the Lord our God: and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.
Today if you shall hear his voice, harden not your hearts:
As in the provocation, according to the day of temptation in the wilderness: where your fathers tempted me, they proved me, and saw my works.
Forty years long was I offended with that generation, and I said: These always err in heart.
And these men have not known my ways: so I swore in my wrath that they shall not enter into my rest.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Antiphon: Come, let us adore the Lord, for he made us.
PSALMODY
Psalm 118 (119):145–152
Antiphon: Thou art near, O Lord: and all thy ways are truth.
I cried with my whole heart, hear me, O Lord: I will seek thy justifications.
I cried unto thee, save me: that I may keep thy commandments.
I prevented the dawning of the day, and cried: because in thy words I very much hoped.
My eyes to thee have prevented the morning: that I might meditate on thy words.
Hear thou my voice, O Lord, according to thy mercy: and quicken me according to thy judgment.
They that persecute me have drawn nigh to iniquity; but they are gone far off from thy law.
Thou art near, O Lord: and all thy ways are truth.
I have known from the beginning concerning thy testimonies: that thou hast founded them for ever.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Antiphon: Thou art near, O Lord: and all thy ways are truth.
Canticle — Wisdom 9:1–6, 9–11
Antiphon: Let thy wisdom be with me, O Lord, and labour with me.
God of my fathers, and Lord of mercy, who hast made all things with thy word,
And by thy wisdom hast appointed man, that he should have dominion over the creature that was made by thee,
That he should order the world according to equity and justice, and execute justice with an upright heart:
Give me wisdom, that sitteth by thy throne, and cast me not off from among thy children:
For I am thy servant, and the son of thy handmaid, a weak man, and of short time, and falling short of the understanding of judgment and laws.
For if one be perfect among the children of men, yet if thy wisdom be not with him, he shall be nothing regarded.
And thy wisdom with thee, which knoweth thy works, which then also was present when thou madest the world, and knew what was agreeable to thy eyes, and what was right in thy commandments.
Send her out of thy holy heaven, and from the throne of thy majesty, that she may be with me, and may labour with me, that I may know what is acceptable with thee:
For she knoweth and understandeth all things, and shall lead me soberly in my works, and shall preserve me by her power.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Antiphon: Let thy wisdom be with me, O Lord, and labour with me.
Psalm 116 (117)
Antiphon: The truth of the Lord remaineth for ever.
O praise the Lord, all ye nations: praise him, all ye people.
For his mercy is confirmed upon us: and the truth of the Lord remaineth for ever.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Antiphon: The truth of the Lord remaineth for ever.
SHORT READING
Philippians 2:14–15
And do ye all things without murmurings and hesitations;
That you may be blameless, and sincere children of God, without reproof, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation; among whom you shine as lights in the world.
SHORT RESPONSORY
I cried unto thee, O Lord; thou art my refuge.
I cried unto thee, O Lord; thou art my refuge.
Thou art my portion in the land of the living.
Thou art my refuge.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
I cried unto thee, O Lord; thou art my refuge.
GOSPEL OF THE DAY
Luke 11:27–28
And it came to pass, as he spoke these things, a certain woman from the crowd, lifting up her voice, said to him:
Blessed is the womb that bore thee, and the paps that gave thee suck.
But he said:
Yea rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God, and keep it.
BENEDICTUS
Antiphon: Blessed are they who hear the word of God, and keep it.
Canticle of Zachary — Luke 1:68–79
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; because he hath visited and wrought the redemption of his people:
And hath raised up an horn of salvation to us, in the house of David his servant:
As he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets, who are from the beginning:
Salvation from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us:
To perform mercy to our fathers, and to remember his holy testament,
The oath, which he swore to Abraham our father, that he would grant to us,
That being delivered from the hand of our enemies, we may serve him without fear,
In holiness and justice before him, all our days.
And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways:
To give knowledge of salvation to his people, unto the remission of their sins:
Through the bowels of the mercy of our God, in which the Orient from on high hath visited us:
To enlighten them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death: to direct our feet into the way of peace.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Antiphon: Blessed are they who hear the word of God, and keep it.
INTERCESSIONS
Christ has given us his word not merely that we may admire it, but that it may become life within us. With confidence we pray:
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
For thy Church throughout the world: strengthen the Holy Father, bishops, priests, deacons, religious, and all thy faithful people, that what we profess with our lips may be visible in our lives.
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
For those entrusted with authority in nations and communities: give them wisdom to recognize what is true and courage to act upon it.
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
For all who begin their work this morning: bless the labour of our hands, keep us honest in small duties, patient in difficulty, and generous toward those with whom we work.
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
For our homes and families: preserve affection, patience, fidelity, forgiveness, and the quiet acts of service by which love becomes real.
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
For those who suffer in body, mind, or spirit; for those who are lonely, frightened, grieving, unemployed, displaced, or forgotten: send them consolation and faithful companions.
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
For those who know what is right but find obedience difficult: give courage for the next faithful act.
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
For our beloved dead and for all who have died in hope of the resurrection: receive them into the light and peace of thy presence.
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
For ourselves: save us from mistaking good intentions for obedience, admiration for discipleship, and words about faith for faith itself.
Lord, teach us to hear thy word and keep it.
OUR FATHER
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
Amen.
CONCLUDING PRAYER
O God, whose word is truth and whose commandments lead us into life, give us ears ready to hear thee and hearts ready to obey.
Grant that the faith we profess may pass into the ordinary things we do: into our work and speech, our homes and friendships, our patience and forgiveness, our duties and sacrifices.
May thy wisdom labour with us this day, so that hearing thy word we may keep it, and keeping it may come more nearly to resemble thy Son.
Through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
BLESSING
May the Lord bless us, protect us from all evil, and bring us to everlasting life.
Amen.
THE PARADOX OF THE DAY
The word of God becomes ours only when we stop merely listening to it.
CHESTERTON FOR THE MORNING
“If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.”
— G. K. Chesterton, What’s Wrong with the World
A CHESTERTONIAN MEDITATION
There is probably something in your house that has been waiting to be done.
Perhaps it is a hinge that squeaks, a drawer that sticks, a letter that ought to be answered, a photograph that ought to be framed, a tool that belongs somewhere other than where you left it, or a small mountain of papers that has somehow acquired geological permanence.
The remarkable thing is that none of these problems suffers from a lack of information.
The hinge has not been waiting for a seminar on hinges.
The letter has not remained unanswered because we lack a sufficiently developed philosophy of correspondence.
We know.
And that is precisely the difficulty.
There is a strange modern superstition that knowledge naturally produces action. We collect information, advice, books, podcasts, articles, plans, lists, applications, notifications, and increasingly elaborate systems for reminding ourselves of things we already know.
Then we feel faintly virtuous because we have become very well informed about duties we have not performed.
Christ’s sentence this morning is devastating because it is so short.
A woman in the crowd praises Him by praising His mother. There is something wonderfully human in the outburst. She has heard Christ speak and cries out, in effect, what a mother this man must have had.
And she is right.
But Christ takes her admiration and turns it from applause into discipleship.
“Yea rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God, and keep it.”
The sentence is not a rebuke of Mary. It reveals the deepest reason for her blessedness.
Mary did precisely this.
She heard.
And then she answered.
“Behold the handmaid of the Lord.”
The glory of Mary is not merely biological proximity to Christ. It is obedience to God. Before the Word was carried beneath her heart, the word of God had been received by her heart.
And suddenly the Gospel becomes uncomfortable, because we cannot leave Mary safely on a pedestal.
Christ points toward her and says, in effect: Do likewise.
Hear.
Keep.
The distance between those two words may be only a few letters on a page, but much of the Christian life is lived in the territory between them.
We hear that we should forgive.
Then comes the person who actually needs forgiving.
We hear that we should love our neighbour.
Then the neighbour does something remarkably neighbourly, such as parking badly, making noise, disagreeing with us, borrowing something indefinitely, or choosing the exact moment when we are busiest to require our attention.
We hear that we should pray.
Then morning arrives.
We hear that we should be grateful.
Then something goes wrong.
We hear that we should trust God.
Then we encounter something genuinely frightening.
Suddenly Christianity ceases to be a collection of beautiful propositions and becomes a hinge that needs oiling.
This is where Chesterton’s famous remark about doing things badly becomes useful—and where it is frequently misunderstood.
“If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.”
He was not praising incompetence.
He was defending participation.
The important things in human life are precisely those things we cannot leave exclusively to experts. A man may sing badly to his child and nevertheless be infinitely more right to sing than to hire a professional singer to take his place. A mother may draw badly, cook imperfectly, garden erratically, or tell a story without literary polish; but these things are worth doing because love is worth doing.
And so is obedience.
We sometimes postpone goodness because we are waiting to perform it magnificently.
We imagine a future version of ourselves who rises early, prays attentively, forgives immediately, gives generously, works cheerfully, exercises regularly, never loses patience, remembers every birthday, answers every email, and has somehow solved the problem of the kitchen drawer.
This person is admirable.
He is also imaginary.
God has given us somebody else to work with.
Us.
Today.
The first psalm of Morning Prayer gives us a wonderful picture of this. The psalmist cries out before dawn. He does not possess everything. He does not understand everything. He simply gets up early enough to hope in God’s word.
“At first light” he cries to God.
There is something almost comic in the humility of it.
Before we have fixed the world, before we have understood the world, before in many cases we have even had coffee, the Church puts words into our mouths.
Call upon God.
Ask for wisdom.
Praise Him.
Listen.
Then get up and live accordingly.
The Canticle from Wisdom makes the point even more clearly. Human intelligence by itself is insufficient. Even the cleverest man is nothing without the wisdom of God.
So we ask Wisdom not merely to instruct us but to work with us.
That is an extraordinary phrase.
Wisdom is not merely something to put into the head.
Wisdom comes into the workshop.
It stands beside the desk.
It enters the kitchen.
It gets into the truck.
It goes to the meeting.
It sits beside the hospital bed.
It accompanies us into the difficult conversation.
Divine wisdom is not an ornament for religious thought. It is meant to labour with us.
That is why Christ says “keep” the word.
A kept word becomes visible.
If we have heard mercy, somebody ought eventually to be forgiven.
If we have heard generosity, something ought eventually to be given away.
If we have heard truth, some lie ought eventually to be abandoned.
If we have heard gratitude, somebody ought eventually to be thanked.
If we have heard “love your neighbour,” then at some point the neighbour must encounter something that looks suspiciously like love.
This does not mean salvation is earned by accumulating successful performances. Saint Paul makes exactly the opposite point in today’s Mass reading: we are children of God through faith in Christ Jesus.
But a child begins to resemble his father.
Grace does not leave us sitting where it found us, congratulating ourselves on having understood grace.
It moves.
The curious thing is that the smallest acts may be the most revealing.
We naturally imagine holiness in heroic proportions. Martyrs, missionaries, monasteries, deserts, pilgrimages.
God certainly calls some people into spectacular acts of courage.
But most of us spend most of our lives among dishes, paperwork, traffic, deadlines, laundry, tools, phone calls, grocery lists, sick relatives, difficult colleagues, unfinished projects, and people we love enough to find occasionally exasperating.
That is not the scenery outside the spiritual life.
That is where the spiritual life is happening.
The great adventure may be concealed in the next ordinary duty.
Perhaps that is one reason Christ’s words are so wonderfully simple.
He does not say blessed are those who have developed an exhaustive theological comprehension of the word of God.
He says blessed are those who hear it and keep it.
A child can understand that.
A scholar can spend his whole life learning to do it.
And Mary did it perfectly.
This morning, therefore, we need not solve our entire spiritual lives.
We need not become saints by lunchtime.
We need only refuse the comfortable illusion that hearing is the same as doing.
There is almost certainly one thing we already know.
One apology.
One prayer.
One duty.
One kindness.
One difficult phone call.
One person to forgive.
One promise to keep.
One neglected thing to finish.
One person in the house who needs our attention more than our advice.
Perhaps holiness begins this morning not with discovering some magnificent secret but with doing the obvious thing we have already heard.
Even if we do it awkwardly.
Even if we do it imperfectly.
Even if we have to begin again tomorrow.
The word of God is not a museum piece to be admired beneath glass.
It is a seed.
And the only proper compliment to a seed is to put it into the ground.
CLOSING
Lord, give us grace today not merely to admire what is good, but to do it.
Let thy wisdom work beside us in all the ordinary places of this day.
And when thy word comes to us, give us the simplicity of Mary:
to hear,
to answer,
and to keep it.
Chesterton Radio