You can tell a lot about our yes and no!

 In a day of instant marketing, we can be aware of how easily it is to entice people to make a positive response over a negative one. The proposition is that our life would be better off if we see yes to something rather than no. We want to feel good about ourselves. Yet we know that any decision has consequences not only for ourselves but also for others. This is why we should not be rushed into giving a response just to clear the table for what we may consider other important things. We need to make a consideration not only what we think but also what consequences will flow from how we put our thinking into action and whether our hearts are centered on making transitions in our lives. 

We see this played out with the two people who are called to work in the vineyard. The first makes a quick response which is no and then ponders more deeply and considers that he will actually go to the vineyard. The second makes a quick yes but then does not follow it through. I think this is important whenever we are called to consider an important decision. There is a need to notice any resistance inside ourselves and to bring this before God in prayer. Sometimes we are unsure about why this arises but often it is a balancing of our priorities with how this will cause a change in life to which I need to be deeply committed. Our responses should be drawn from us not by fear or manipulation but rather by a heartfelt consideration of what is both good for me and good for another.

So often in the discussions, we see how these voices seem to besiege us by saying we are too woke or too redneck. The labeling and judging of others can cause us to close off this consideration. There are already too many memes and asides, ten-second sound grabs, and knowing glances to cause us to become uneasy about where we actually stand in life. At the heart of any discussion is where our yeses and nos lead us and leave us. Are they just matters of convenience to safeguard us from deeper commitment to the common good of others? This is the desire to be authentic, whole-hearted, and united in love. 

As St. Paul says in Philippians 2, "Always consider the other person to be better than yourself so that nobody thinks of his own interests first but everybody thinks of other people's interests instead. In your minds, you must be the same as Christ Jesus! His state was divine, yet he did not cling to his equality with God but emptied himself to assume the condition of a slave, and became as men are; and being as all men are, he was humbler yet, even to accepting death, death on the cross. But God raised him him and gave him the name which is above other names so that all beings in the heavens, on earth, and in the underworld, should bend the knee at the name of Jesus and that every tongue should acclaim Jesus Christ as Lord, to the glory of God the Father." What will I say yes to in life and how will I put my life on the line.