NOTES for Luk 18:18-43
What does it take to be a good person? The answer is more or less clear even to those who have not read Scripture: do not deceive, do not kill, respect others... The healthiest human communities are founded on these principles. And what more could one wish for people? Without violence and lies, the world would be immeasurably better...
And yet there are people for whom this is not enough. They leave everything and accomplish the impossible. Like Mother Maria (Skobtsova), who went to the gas chamber in place of another woman; like Mother Teresa of Calcutta, who cared with her own hands for the poor and people with leprosy in India; like the many martyrs, ancient and modern, for whom their lives proved less precious than their faith; like, finally, the apostles themselves, who laid down their lives to preach the word of Christ throughout the world.
What tears these people away from their settled, secure places and drives them onto the path of holiness? How does this spiritual insight occur? What are we to do, who have heard the Gospel call many times and remained indifferent to it? How can we keep Jesus from passing us by, past our darkness? Perhaps, like that blind man, we should cry into the darkness: “Son of David, have mercy on us!”