Wants and Needs

And the people brought to him a paralytic lying on a stretcher.

When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic,




"Courage, child, your sins are forgiven."

When I was a boy about eight years old I decided that what would make me king of the neighborhood was a rifle.  It's not like it would have been a huge expense for my parents because my father worked at Spiegel's which was once a huge mail order catalog store so he received a discount on all of the stuff he purchased there. Now, if you've followed the bits and pieces of my story that I have revealed in this blog you will know that I lived on the southwest side of Chicago and while it might have been cool to own a rifle, it would serve no practical purpose what so ever.  So, in spite of all my hints, a 22 caliber rifle was never one of the things that I owned and truth be told a couple of weeks after the thought entered my head, it left, its place taken be another childhood want.  My parents were good at fulfilling my needs and often got me stuff that was not on my list.  For example, I was packed off to an orthodontist in spite of my moaning and groaning that I did not need my teeth straightened. I did, they knew it, they acted upon it and it was an act of love, an act of fulfilling a need.

In our reading today, a lot of commentators will comment on what the enemies of Jesus were thinking and how Jesus got the best of them.  But I think there is shown here a Jesus who tenderly separates needs from wants for the paralyzed person.  He could see that the person could not walk or move. He knew that because he had two eyes to see.  He also could see deep into the victim's soul and he saw a need there that was more important to fix than any physical problem and he tackled it head on.  He forgave the sins of the paralyzed person.  We can only imagine what those sins were after all what sins could a person who could not move commit?  Well, we can only speculate but Jesus knew, he saw a need, and he proceeded to fulfill it. Was the person on the stretcher surprised?  Were they disappointed?  Or did they feel the freedom and joy that forgiveness brings?  We are not told.  Once Jesus satisfied the person's needs, He then satisfied the wants.

When we pray, maybe we should ask for the many things that we need to turn our life so as to mirror the life of Christ.  All of these things will be granted to us and later, at a time where it is optimal for our salvation, our wants will be satisfied as well.  Holiness comes when we trust our Lord to fulfill both wants and needs.