This essay first appeared in our weekly Scripture reflection newsletter on August 9, 2025.
Wis 18:6-9; Heb 11: 1-2, 8-19; Lk 12:32-48
You can find the readings for the 19th Sunday of Ordinary Time here.
When I studied the New Testament in graduate school under Daniel J. Harrington, S.J., he offered our class a memorable image of how to imagine the Gospel writers (a.k.a. the Evangelists) editing the four Gospels.
He told us to imagine the evangelists with “scraps of paper” on a desk in front of them, each one having perhaps one of Jesus’ parables written on them, or one of his sayings or a story from his life. Obviously, the evangelists strove to put them in order (that is, from the birth of Jesus to his public ministry to his passion, death and resurrection) but sometimes there were places where the evangelists had to decide where to “place” an event, a parable or a saying.
That is why some sayings or parables seem to be in surprising places, or why different Gospels have slightly different sequences, while agreeing on the overall outline of the story. (This is especially the case with the Synoptic Gospels: Mark, Matthew and Luke.) The “oral period” of the Gospels, when the stories were passed down orally, also explains why there are sometimes different versions of the same stories. As N.T. Wright pointed out, Jesus might also have preached his parables in different ways in different locations, so variations would naturally “abound,” as Wright said.
We are meant to be ready not only for the coming of the reign of God, but also for the end of our lives and the end of time, which will come, as we hear today, like a “thief in the night.”
This week’s Gospel may be a case in point. Last week, Jesus offered his disciples the Parable of the Rich Fool, in which a man decides to build bigger barns to store his increasing treasure, not realizing that later that night he will die and be called upon to give an account of his life. That section ends with the first part of this week’s Gospel, in which Jesus tells his disciples not to store up treasure on Earth, but rather in heaven, where no thief can get at it. “For where your treasure is, there also your heart will be.” It’s one of my favorite sayings, and I’ll return to it in a bit.
The next part of the Gospel is, however, a kind of double parable (or two parables) about preparedness. In the first part, Jesus tells us the story of vigilant stewards who are ready for their master’s return from a wedding. Delighted, the master even waits on them. Then Jesus offers the image of a wicked servant who, also awaiting his master’s return, beats the other servants and then faces dire consequences.
At first glance, it seems as if Luke has perhaps thrown these two “scraps of paper” together willy-nilly. The first part of today’s Gospel is a conclusion of a warning on not storing up treasure in the wrong places; the second a warning to be prepared for the master’s return.
But, in fact, both make the same point: Nothing should come between us and God. The servants in the double parable are supposed to be focused on the coming of the master; nothing should distract them. As in many of Jesus’ parables, the point is an urgent call to preparedness. We are meant to be ready not only for the coming of the reign of God, but also for the end of our lives and the end of time, which will come, as we hear today, like a “thief in the night.”
What’s in your heart? Is it a concern about power, wealth, fame, appearance or something else powered by pride? Is that what fills your heart today?
For me, however, the even more powerful image is that of the heart.
So, we can ask: Where is your heart today? Jesus says that where your treasure is—what you value—there you will find your heart. Another way to ask this is: What’s in your heart? Is it a concern about power, wealth, fame, appearance or something else powered by pride? Is that what fills your heart today?
In Rev 3:20, Jesus says, “Listen! I am standing at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door I will come in…” But if your heart is crowded with too many other things, there won’t be any room for Jesus. The key to these parables, then, is a kind of singleheartedness.
Your heart is like a room. Why not escort all the things that are crowding that room out the door? Then there will be room for Jesus, who is your treasure.
