[AI translation] My Christian Brothers and Sisters! There is an old, forgotten word in Scripture, a phrase that is out of fashion: safari. It once had a very deep meaning, but perhaps it has become worn out and tarnished by so much use, and now it lingers in some secluded corner of our souls, where we have put it away as an old memory. The trouble is, then, that the practice of safari has gone out of fashion with the word, and today we can hardly find anyone who would try to put the concept of safari into practice in life. Well, Brothers and Sisters, on the threshold of the new ecclesial year, when the various branches of the Belmishops' work are being launched, it is of particular importance that the idea of the sacrament be understood by as many people as possible. The kingdom of God, and with it all its benefits and blessings, will spread the more the more people become aware of their being a Shaphar. So let us take this old, outdated and faded word out of the dustbin of our souls, wipe the dust off it, see how much precious value there is in this word: Sappharity, and try to fill it with meaning and life again."As each of you has received a gift of grace, so give it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold graces of God." (1Pt 4,10) "But what is required of all who are called is that each one may be found worthy of the other," says our Word. In these two Words God tells us what is the basis of the office of a sacristan, then what is required of him, and finally what is the use of it.
1) This word "Shaphar" in the original language of the Bible expresses much more than it does in the English translation. It means a servant who is set by his lord in his house or estate, and entrusted with the care, custody and management of a certain portion of his property. A shafar is therefore not a landlord, but a servant who manages the property or goods belonging to the lord. Transposing this now into the plane of the divine household, the shaphir means that all things in this world, all material and spiritual possessions, belong directly and exclusively to the living God. His property is time, nation, family; His property is my money, my house, my body, my soul, my leisure, my skill, my physical or mental ability; His property is my child or my spouse. My life is like a big household. In one room I spend the quiet moments of my individual life, in another room I live my family life, the third room is the work space I do outwardly, to the world as official or public work. But in this large household, which represents my life, not a single piece of furniture is mine, the individual rooms within the walls of which my life flows are not individual rooms of a condominium, I am not the owner of the house. The landlord is God, and I am only the custodian of His property. Now this is the opposite of how we often see and live our lives. It often happens to an old servant that in the absence of his master he behaves as if he were master of the house. The more property the master has entrusted to the servant, the more wealth he has placed in him as overseer and steward, the greater the temptation to presumption and master-masculinity.
Now, Brethren, we feel ourselves more like a landlord in the management of the goods of our lives than a trustee of the landlord. How self-congratulatory one's talents can make one, how exalted one can become at the sight of one's artistic inclinations, how much glory and recognition one pockets as naturally as if it were all his own, not God's, from whom he has received his talents as a commission. How cold and cruel one's wealth can make one! To believe that one has the right to manage one's money and time as one pleases! One is even willing to take God to court sometimes when God takes away from us someone or something that we have so much claimed as our own that we think even He should have nothing to do with it. How much we do not live in the consciousness of our being a shapar is also shown by the fact that even when we give something to God, time, service or money, we feel as if we were doing something good: we give it as a sacrifice.
The Shaphar knows that God has the title to whatever he asks of him, whatever he demands of him, for all that he has is in trust with him, and the profits, the fruit, and the title of ownership belong to God. The ground of my charity, then, is this: all that I have belongs to God - and to acknowledge this is not a great grace, but a duty on my part.
2) The requirement of the Safarist is expressed in the Scriptures, "Now the thing required of the Safarist is that every one should be found worthy of the calling." The office of shaphara is a position of trust. A man would not willingly admit anybody into his house, nor would he willingly leave anybody there for long years, even decades, among his precious possessions, nor would he willingly entrust the keys of his drawer of valuables to anybody, even for safekeeping, let alone for the management of them. One would dare to hire someone for such a job after long, long selection and perhaps after repeated trials. Loyal service over many years may give one confidence in the other person that he will do everything as accurately as he would have done it himself.
God trusts everyone in advance. He entrusts to each person one or more of his eternal treasures. To one man He gives artistic talent, to another the precious gift of persuasion, to a third a lot of leisure, to yet another He entrusts vast sums of money or arable land. He does not first ask anyone whether he deserves these values - God puts his trust in everyone. In his great divine household, he hires the prophets, then leaves them alone for a while and lets them take care of those entrusted to them.
Now all of us who are here are such trustees, such shaphars of God. Let us now discuss among ourselves how we treat those entrusted to us. It is only easy for us now that our Master is away, but this absence from Him makes it very easy for us to forget that when He returns (or rather, when we return home to Him), we must give an account of all things. How faithful I have been would be immediately apparent if Jesus were to run through the accounts of my life. I wonder what Jesus would say if He looked in your account book, Brother? What would you say to him if he took account of your words, the work of your two hands, the 24 hours of your day? What would a young woman or a man who has renounced the religion of his children say if Jesus were to ask him for an account of the faith of his children and grandchildren? He would claim in vain that he had remained faithful to his church, because he had not renounced it. Jesus would most certainly declare them to be unfaithful satraps. Our sacramental ministry is full of unfaithfully squandered goods, of missed precious opportunities - do we still deserve the trust of our master?!
And yet how simple is the demand on the safekeeper: only to be found faithful. Faithful stewardship does not mean faultlessness and perfection - for whatever one lays one's hands on, one is sure to find fault with; only he who does nothing makes no mistakes - but to be faithful where one is placed, to use to the full what one has been given, to do what one can, but to do it with all one's heart and with all one's soul. But faithfulness also means doing nothing beyond your strength. He who undertakes work beyond his strength is an unfaithful Shaphar, because he has abused that strength, has overtaxed that strength which is not his, but only entrusted to him. Physical or mental collapse or nervous exhaustion is usually the result of such unfaithful saffronism.
My brothers and sisters, we still have time before the final, great reckoning, let us all strive to be found faithful in the sacrament of the sacrament!
3) Finally, a characteristic of the work of the Sabbath is that it is always of benefit to the other person. Our basic motto is: "as each of you has received gifts of grace, so share them with one another". The service which I, in the consciousness of my charity as God's charity, perform in the world, in human terms too, is the most perfect service from a social point of view. The gift of God's grace can be hidden by a man, buried within himself, like the talent of a servant. So did a Buddhist man who, after having absorbed himself in the various sciences, walled himself up and lived there for years, shut off from the world. In the small hole where his food was fed to him, he happily proclaimed his love for all people, evil and good, the knowledgeable and the unconscious. He never said a word to harm anyone - but he never did anyone any good either. There are such unproductive well-wishers today; there is nothing bad to be said of them, only that there is nothing good to be said of them. I wonder what precious divine values, what talents entrusted to them, are lying dormant, buried and hidden in the depths of the souls of such people? Safekeeping is not simply custodianship, but first and foremost the management, rotation and utilisation of wealth.
But a man may manage and turn over the gift of God's grace in such a way that he sees the use of it only in himself and no one else: if a man seeks to use all his material, physical, spiritual and intellectual talents, but in such a way that he seeks his own profit and glory, and in so doing wants to become great, influential and respected, he is just as much a false steward as one who buries what is entrusted to him. For my labour is charity when it is of benefit first of all to the other man.
If you want to know, my Brother, whether you have been truly or falsely sparing in your life so far, think back to your brothers and sisters for whom you have wiped their tears, appeased their hunger, covered their cold bodies. Think of those whom you led to Christ through your good word, through the example of your life. Think of the moments, the hours, from which you have brought physical and spiritual blessings to those around you - or think of the people you have not done this for, who have waited in vain for you to share with them the gifts of grace entrusted to you. At the same time, think of what Jesus said, that whoever gives food or drink to one of His least ones does it for Him - and whoever does not give, neglects Him. It is an old truth that the surest way to Jesus Christ is through the heart of another.
Brothers and sisters, at the beginning of this new Church year, tiny Sunday School children's hands reach out to us and call us to lead them along the narrow path to God on the way to the kingdom of heaven. Our poor and sick are asking us to visit them in their distress and help them as we can. Our various Bible classes cry out and ask our young men and women, young men and women, to use their time in such a way that an hour is set aside each week for the cultivation of brotherly fellowship and for prayer together. All the work of our Church, and through it Jesus Christ himself, asks of each member of our Church the time, the love, the devotion, the service and the material sacrifice which each sacristan owes to God as a gift of grace from God.
God has distributed his precious things among us so that "each one of us, as he has received a gift of grace, may be a good steward of the manifold graces of God". My brothers and sisters, the recipients of God's manifold graces, come, let us make use of them to the glory of our Heavenly Host.
Amen.
Date: 1 October 1939.
Lesson
1Pt 4.10