Luke 6:27-38, 7th Sunday in Ordinary Time

“For the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you (Lk 6:38).”

Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes. How do you measure, measure a year? … How about love?

Well, how about love? How do you measure love? 

Do we measure it:

How do we measure love? 

Today, Jesus himself tells us how. We measure love by looking at the remainder. We measure love from what remains after we have fulfilled all that is proper and fair. We measure love from the extra of our exchanges.

Our Lord is clear: if you love only those who love you, what “credit” is that to you? If you do good only to those who are good to you, what “credit” is that to you? 

 Credit can be a bit vague. It suggests something transactional. In the Greek of the Gospel, the word is “charis” which means grace or thanks. And so Jesus’ question can be recast this way: if you only return what is given to you, what grace or thanks have you? What is there to be thankful for?

We readily love those who love us. Loving our own is not heavy on the heart. Even those who reject God take care of their own. Those who are bad can even be good to those who are good to them. 

 In this kind of reciprocity, there is no remainder. In this exchange, there is no extra. There is no credit, no charis, no grace, no thanks to be had. In this transaction, there is only quid pro quo, literally, something for something, kaliwaan, suklian. In this give-and-take there is only a falsely assuring sense of parity. 

The equality in the exchange excuses us from the more that we are about and the more that we need to do. The kaliwaan acquits us of any dagdag or additional commitment. Quits, we say, quits na tayo.   

But to those who are God’s children (and that means all of us here), there is no such thing as quits. That is because to be a child of God is to bear the image and likeness of God who is love. 

 In bearing this likeness to God, we sense that our hearts are not shaped to be small. Our minds are not made to be closed. Our hands are not meant to be clenched.

To be made in the likeness of God is to bear the cruciform likeness of him who redeems us on the cross. Far from being a sign of defeat, the cross reveals to us God’s glory and true power. On the cross, love does not run away from enmity and hate and violence. On the cross of Christ, love stays no matter the hate and violence thrown at it. Only love remains.

 It does not take much to return hate with hate, fire with fire, quid pro quo, kaliwaan. Only cowards hide behind hate and violence. Their hearts are small whose only weapon is to foment fear and feed the cycle of vengeance. 

 We who must carry our cross daily to follow Christ know that love is borne by the brave of heart. 

 Moreover, as children of God bearing God’s image and likeness, we cannot but acknowledge that what God has given us is beyond measure. How does one respond to someone whose giving never ends? How does one reciprocate love when love is not fungible or interchangeable or replaceable? 

As children of God, we are quick to recognize the magnitude of our utang na loob, our interior debt of gratitude. Even to each other, we incur this utang na loob. This debt is is our way of valuing the invaluable, the gifts we know we can never repay. And so in gratitude, in some dialects we say, Dios mabalos, Dios ti agngina. May God return your kindness, may God value your graciousness.   

 So then how are we to measure love? In daylights, in sunsets, in laughter, in strife? How are we to measure the immeasurable, the non-fungible, the gifts that never end?

 Today, we know how. Love is measured from the remainder. We measure love from what remains beyond the kaliwaan and suklian. We measure love out of the gifts we give in “good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing”. There is charis or thanks to be had in gifts we give beyond what we are obliged to offer.

 How do we measure love? We measure love from whatever spills forth from our cups running over.