Our Deeds Go Before Us

Deacon Douglas McManaman

Last month I was out with a few fellas from our parish men’s prayer group, and the reading our leader gave out for us to reflect upon (“The Great Project of Our Life”, Msgr. Fred Dolan ) contained a Jewish tale that, after reading it, I knew I would use at some point. A rabbi in Toronto told this story at a funeral; he said that in a kingdom long, long ago, there was a woman who had three friends. One of them she adored; they were in touch every day. As for the second friend, the two of them would get together once a month for a coffee. As for the third friend, they were rarely ever in touch. One day, however, this woman was summoned to the castle by the King. When she received that summons, she was terrified. And so she called her first friend, the one whom she adored and asked: “Can you please go with me to the castle? I’m really frightened.” The friend said, “No. Forget it, I will not go with you.” Terribly disillusioned, she turned to the second friend, filled with hope. The second friend, however, said: “I will go with you as far as the doors of the castle, but I will not take one step beyond that point.” On the verge of despair, she turned to her third friend, without expecting a great deal. To her great surprise, the third friend said: “I would be delighted to go with you. Not only will I accompany you, I will go ahead of you to prepare the way to make sure that everything is ready for you to see the King.” 

What does this mean? The first friend, the one who was adored, represents all our money. When we die, our money does us no good whatsoever; it will not even go with us to the castle. We’ve all heard the old adage that we’ll never see a hearse pulling a U-Haul trailer–we can’t take anything with us. But what about the second friend, the one who would go all the way to the gates of the castle but no further? This friend represents our family, who will be there at our side when we are on our deathbed, but they cannot go any further than that. Who, then, is this mysterious third friend, the one who will accompany us and even go ahead of us to prepare the way? That third friend is our mitzvot, which is the plural of mitzvah, which is Hebrew for our good deeds. Our deeds accompany us and even go ahead of us to prepare the way for us to meet the King of kings. 

This is a wonderful tale that illustrates what ultimately matters in this life, which is “the day to day leaving behind us a trail of mitzvot”, that is, good deeds. 

There is a real unity between love of God and love of others. The more a person loves God, the more that person loves all who belong to God, and human beings belong to God. That’s what holiness is–love of God and neighbor. Holiness is not the same as piety or devotional practices. These are certainly good, but a person can easily be pious and fervently religious without being holy, that is, without the love of God and neighbor, as Jesus implies in Matthew: Although you prophesied in my name, cast out demons in my name, worked miracles in my name, I never knew you (Mt 7, 21-23). And so, appearances can be deceiving.

Mother Teresa said very often: “Not all of us can do great things, but we can do small things with great love”. Doing small things with great love moves this world forward in ways that are beyond our purview. We cannot see the effects of those small acts of great love, but God is not subject to the passing of time, so all our deeds in time are present to God all at once, eternally. Our good deeds are the sacrifices that rise to him like the sweet smoke of incense–the incense at a liturgy is just a symbolic representation of these small acts of great love, which include our prayers. Your day to day labors, if they are carried out with great love for God and neighbor, are that pleasing incense; they are genuine acts of worship, no matter what that work is. I met a former student of mine recently while taking out the garbage–he was the garbage man who grabbed and dumped my trash can. He kept trying to justify his job, as if he was embarrassed by it. But there is nothing to be embarrassed about. That work has great dignity, and it is utterly important work, and if it is done with great love for the common good, it is holy and has eternal value. Our good deeds are like the materials that we lay at the feet of Christ, who takes those materials and builds a mansion with them, one that will be our eternal dwelling place, as Christ says in the gospel of John: “In my Father’s house, there are many mansions” (Jn 14, 2). 

English poet William Wordsworth said: The best portion of a good man’s life is his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and love (From ‘Lines Written a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, on Revisiting the Banks of the Wye during a Tour, July 13, 1798.’). And that’s the point of sacrificial offerings to God, especially the Old Testament sacrifices, to offer Him the best portion of what we have, the first fruits of the harvest or the first born of the flock. The best portion of our life is our little, nameless, and unremembered acts of kindness and love.