In our Epistle today, Saint Paul says knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. I don't know about you, but for me this is a challenging passage because I value knowledge. I value knowing things and learning new things. I value growing in my knowledge. I value education in general and I value my own education in particular. I value the degrees that I have earned and the degree I am working on. I value the classes, the teachers, the books, the projects, the papers, and yes, even the tests because all those have helped me grow in my knowledge. I hope I never stop learning during my life. I want to learn new things, to know new things. I think that knowledge is really important. I am so grateful for all the people who have been learning about the Coronavirus this year, to grow our knowledge of this virus. I am grateful for all the people who have figured out how the virus spreads and teach us ways that we can keep ourselves and the community safer. I value all the doctors and nurses who have been figuring out how to take care of patients if they happen to get Coronavirus so we can help them make it through that disease and survive. I am really grateful for all those researchers who figure out how to make vaccines and how we can distribute vaccines safely and effectively in order to get us through this pandemic. I am grateful for this huge body of knowledge that has grown in this past year as we have struggled with this pandemic. That knowledge is valuable.
I hope I'm not being too defensive when I come to this passage today, but I do not think St. Paul is saying that knowledge is bad. I think it has value, and I think he would say it has value. St. Paul knows a lot of stuff. He is writing letters to people because he wants to pass along that knowledge to them so they can grow in their knowledge, so they can learn new things and incorporate that into their life and act accordingly. He talks often in his letters about knowing Christ and trying to grow in our understanding. What is it that Christ wants for us in this life? He is making arguments based on knowledge to convince people who are having challenges and problems. I don't think Paul is opposed to knowledge per se. I think that what he is getting at here is that there is a shadow side to knowledge, and that shadow side is arrogance. It is that puffing up, that sense that one person is better than someone else because they know something the other does not. What is happening in that community is that some people know something, and the way they are using that knowledge is causing hurt to other people. What Paul is calling for here is not to stop learning and say knowledge is not important. What he is saying is that knowledge has to be tempered by love. Knowledge puffs up. It is about the individual thinking that they are better in their knowledge that other people don't have. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. It is for the community, for the common good. Knowledge, when tempered with love, is the ideal that Paul is trying to get here. Love is the core of this letter. In just a few more chapters, Paul is going to say those famous words: faith, hope, and love abide, and the greatest of these is love. Paul is trying to show his community that is in great conflict, facing great challenges, that the path through it is love. Certain people know certain things, and that is fine. But don't use that against other people. Don't puff yourself up with that knowledge, but in all things remember love and the way of love that Jesus taught us.
In the Gospel today Jesus finds himself in Capernaum. He encounters a man who has an unclean spirit within him. The unclean spirit says one of the most fascinating things. First of all, the unclean spirit identifies Jesus correctly. The spirit says you are the holy one of God. He knows Him, he recognizes Him. The unclean spirit also asks one of the most important questions in scripture: what do you have to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? This question may come from an unusual source, but I think this is the question that each one of us has to ask. What do you have to do with us? The answer is that he has come to call us to follow him on this way of love, this way of love which is the greatest commandment: love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself. This way of love that was born in Bethlehem, this way of love that will go to the cross, this way of love that will rise again.
Jesus is here to call us to follow him on that way. What do you have to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? To follow him on the way of love. This love that Saint Paul says is the only way to get through the challenges and the conflicts the community in Corinth is facing. This way of love that Jesus calls us to at this time also. This way of love that we need to get through these challenges that we face as a community, the political divisions, this pandemic, racial injustice. All of it can only be gotten through if we follow the way of love, love for our neighbor, love for the other, the way of love that Jesus came to show us. What do you have to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Everything, if we follow him on this way of love.
So, my friends, in Christ, do that. Follow him. It is not always easy. It is not sentimental. It is the path he has shown us. It is the good road. It is the way of love.
AMEN
