THREE THINGS I KNOW

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 30^th Tuesday in Ordinary Time is, “Three Things I Know” or “Three Things I Learned.”

When I read today’s readings - a scripture passage hit me: but I don’t know where to find that scripture passage, so maybe I read it in some other book and it isn’t in the Bible. I don’t know.

Someone said somewhere, “Three things I know….”

So I looked up that phrase last night in a Bible Concordance as well as on Google and found possible possibilities.

The Book of Proverbs - chapter 30 has some numerical proverbs. Maybe that’s what I was remembering.

For example it has this text: “There are 3 things beyond my comprehension, 4 indeed, that I haven’t figured out: how an eagle makes its way through the skies, how a snake slides its way over a rock, how a ship makes its way through high seas and how a man deals with a younger woman.”

For example, “the earth trembles at 3 things - 4 which it cannot endure: a slave who becomes a king; a complainer who has had too much to eat, a jilted girl wed at last, and a slave-girl who supplants her mistress.”

LISTS

Next I found mention of making lists. Some people like lists; some don’t.

How about you?

If you like them, here’s an exercise various folks can do today. Jot down 3 things you know. Have other family members or office workers do the same thing and then compare what each has come up with.

I also noticed that this simple exercise can be done by coming up with 5 things I’ve learned or 7 things or 10 things I learned or know.

TODAY’S READINGS

Today’s readings triggered this thought so here are 3 things I learned from them.

From the first reading and then thinking about marriages that I know, I learned that those with a good marriage know what it takes to have a good marriage - and today’s text would not cause problems for them.

Today’s gospel triggered the thought that one knows when to use mustard - when mustard is used and how mustard makes a difference. So too compliments. They are the mustard or the mayonnaise on the sandwich called “conversations”.

Today’s gospel also tells us bread doesn’t rise without leaven - so too a Christian life - without the bread of life - without being Christian leven.

MY 3 LEARNINGS OR 3 THINGS I KNOW

The title of my homily is, “Three Things I know.”  They are the things I learned about life.

I’m asking you to do your homework on this - so I did my homework last night. Here are 3 things I know.  Tomorrow my list might differ. The value of doing this now - putting them down on paper - pushes one to do some thinking.

So my 3 would be:

·       Nice makes things nice and nasty makes things nasty - so it’s nicer to be nicer than to be nasty.

·       We might be using the same words - and our dictionaries might be the same - but words coming out of our mouth are different than those same words coming from another.

·       There are consequences - and there are consequences from those consequences and on and on and on.

CONCLUSION

That’s homework for today: jot down 3 things you know - 3 things you learned.