Moses Math

Answering what is X

Deuteronomy 30:15-20

Moses said to the people: “Today I have set before you life and prosperity, death and doom. I call heaven and earth today to witness against you: I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the LORD, your God.

Luke 9:22-25

Jesus said to his disciples: “If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. What profit is there for one to gain the whole world yet lose or forfeit himself?”

             I hate math, and I REALLY hate algebra.  I was never any good with numbers, but I could tear it up with letters, with spelling and reading.  But algebra is the worst because it mixes numbers and letters!  Instead of asking like in math, “what is 2 + 2?” algebra asks, “in the equation 2x +2, what is x?”  I wanted to answer, “Well, x is a letter and it has no business in math!”  You know, Shakespeare didn’t do algebra, and so algebra shouldn’t try to sound like Shakespeare!  I always felt like quoting Rudyard Kipling, who wrote, “Oh, East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet, Till Earth and sky stand presently by at God’s great judgment seat!” (“The Ballad of East and West”).  In other words, some things don’t mix well, like letters and numbers: leave algebra for the afterlife, for “God’s great judgment seat.”

             Little did I know that miserable math and even odious algebra are exactly what’s going on in the Bible, especially in our two readings today.  The Old Testament is simple math: 2 + 2 = 4.  Moses says simply, “I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse.  Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live.”  Moses’ math is easy: choice + life = blessings.  But in the New Testament, Jesus teaches us “spiritual algebra” by introducing a variable, the “x” factor.  You see, X is the Greek letter for Christ.  And then the math gets hard, for Jesus says, “For he who wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.”  In other words, Jesus inserts a variable into the equation, namely, himself, the X factor, and we suddenly get very different answers and results.  Now the equation reads: choice(X) + death = blessings.  Now you see why I hate algebra?!  Here’s my point: when Jesus, the X factor, enters the equation of your life, you’re not doing Moses’ math any more, this is algebra of the angels.

            Do you hate math and algebra as much as I do?  Well, even if you’d rather stick with spelling and Shakespeare, you still have to answer the algebraic question: what is X?  And when we realize that the X stands for Christ in the equation of our life, we do amazing and even miraculous things.  Our 40 seminarians have found that X is Christ and chosen what the world considers death (no money, or wife, no children) and found untold blessings.  Immigrants who move to a new country (like the Irish and Germans, the Italians and now Hispanics who moved to Fort Smith), know that X is Christ, and have been blessed abundantly.  Catholics who take Lent seriously by sacrificing legitimate pleasures know X is Christ and await the blessings of Easter (or maybe just next Sunday, when we get a pass on our sacrifice!).

             You see, algebra is advanced math, and not many like it or understand it or embrace it.  Similarly, Christian spirituality is advanced living, and not many like it or understand it or embrace it, because in both cases, you have to answer the question: “what is X”?  X is Christ: where east meets west, north meets south, and sky meets earth.

            Praised be Jesus Christ!