I think I’ve mentioned before that I had a nice long career designing computer chips before coming to Knoxville. In my early years as an engineer, I loved all of the designing that I did as a part of my job. Sometimes I would work excessive hours, especially when deadlines approached. This is pretty common in the computer-chip world. Engineers work long hours from time to time. I remember one weekend, it happened to be a three-day weekend, where I worked from Friday morning through Monday evening without sleeping or pausing except for bathroom breaks and food. I don’t think I’m physically capable of doing that in my current stage of life. Now, there was one project in my career where I worked excessively long hours for more than just a short stint of time. I worked unreasonably long hours month after month. For some people, working like this would be draining or burdensome. Not for me. I liked the work. Inventing a new machine, designing it, manufacturing it, and seeing it operate gave me great joy. So it was easy to spend all of that time doing the work because I really loved designing.
However, one day, in the midst of that, my wife called while I was at work, and she had a subtle message. The ordinary person might not pick up on the real meaning. But I knew this woman and understood what she meant. All she said was, “I now know why women divorce their husbands.” After I hung up the phone, I reflected on what I had been doing at work all of those hours for all those months. I thought about how these deadlines that we kept missing, and how they were extended time and time again. I had made some tradeoffs in my life, and my relationships suffered for it. After about a minute of thinking after that phone call, I left the office and headed home in the middle of the work day.
That day was the end of my wildly out-of-balance life. Just to provide full disclosure, I still work to maintain balance. But before my wife’s phone call, I had made a decision each day to work excessively. I made the decision to put my relationships on hold. Work, work, work. Me, me, me.
I bring up the idea of these daily decisions because I’m not the only one that can get their lives out of balance. It’s deceptive, really, how what we do with our next hour, the rest of our day, how much it matters. What we choose to do with our time makes a big difference.
Long after my wildly out-of-balance life had dissipated and I gave my relationships more of the time they deserved, my ministerial efforts allowed me to sit with some of those who were dying. Not many, but a few of these people had done as I had done and lived wildly out-of-balance lives. They made work their number one priority their whole lives. For them, friends and family were not around to be with them, to take care of them, in these last days of their lives. Predictably, their past coworkers were also not there with them either. In those moments, these people had the time to reflect on their decisions. The little decisions they made day after day, until the little decisions turned into big decisions. They had the time to think about the tradeoffs they made. The cliché is true. I did not hear people say they were so happy they spent their whole life working as they lay on their deathbed.
In John chapter 12, in the story of the grain of wheat, Jesus says, “Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it.”
In my wildly out-of-balance days, I was the grain of wheat that didn’t fall to the ground and die. Instead, I loved my life. It was all about me, me, me. Day by day, I made little decision after little decision to cling to the world and live for myself. Day by day, the chance to live a fruitful life faded, bit by bit. For too many people, sadly, they live a long life, but still, at the end of their earthly life, they are just a grain of wheat.
I understand what it means to fall to the ground and die. I understand how dying to myself produces much fruit. Once I decided to let others into my life, I started to do more listening and less dictating. Eventually, my listening led me to God, led me to Jesus. When I listened to God, and acted on what I received, the graces flowed in my life in extraordinary ways. Not only did my relationships flourish away from work, but they also started growing at work. Instead of losing my career with the significantly reduced hours I kept, which I thought would happen, the opposite came true. It was so hard to understand why less work on my part resulted in promotion after promotion. So counterintuitive.
I share these personal things so that you can see a small fraction of the graces God has given me. What makes it possible for me to be open to receive these God-given graces is the little daily decisions. The choice to listen to God and to act on what is heard, which takes courage. Jesus speaks of his choice to fall to the ground and die. Often, when doing God’s will, it’s not a fun, happy festival celebration. Instead, it looks like we will lose everything that matters to us.
The question that I want to leave with you is this. What if it is true? What if what Jesus says in this Gospel is true? What if loving this life of ours, and making all the little daily decisions to cling to that life, leads to our losing it? What if we turn our back on the glamorous promises of the world, and instead choose to listen to what God would have us do? What would it cost to fall to the ground, to die to our selfishness, and live a godly life? What would it be like to live a life filled with God’s graces, producing much fruit?
If the pattern in the house is costing someone and the costly thing stays unspoken, start with the sentence she actually said. I now know why women divorce their husbands. It was not a speech. I knew what she meant. The deadlines had been extended again, and I had chosen the office. Write the sentence that has been said in your house, even if it was only one line. Then write the daily decision under it. Not the career. The next hour.
The day I left in the middle of the work day was not a personality change. It was one hour given back. Do that once this week. Leave the thing that can wait, and go to the person who has been holding the cost. You do not have to have the whole balance solved. I still work to maintain it. Before the call, I had been deciding each day to put the relationship on hold.
If you are the one who has been waiting to be chosen, say the one sentence before it becomes the only sentence left. Not a verdict on the marriage. The fact of the hour. I needed you here, and you were at the office. The people I sat with at the end did not have family in the room, and the coworkers were not there either. The little decisions had already become the big one. Falling to the ground, in this Gospel, is the daily choice to lose the hour you wanted so the relationship does not stay a grain of wheat.
This is a pastoral reflection, not clinical care and not a substitute for it. If you or someone you love is in immediate danger, call 988 or local emergency services.Drawn from a homily first preached in 2021.