I love clams. Not the baked ones you usually get at restaurants. Clams on the half shell. Raw in all their glory. Growing up in the state of New Jersey, on the Jersey Shore, clams were one of the foods I grew up on. When I go home now there are a few Jersey Foods I try to get. Jersey pizza (cheesy, greasy and foldable!), Mike’s Subs (now known as Jersey Mike’s since they were franchised from its origin in Point Pleasant Beach, NJ) and Clams. Not so much Oysters. Those are more for the upper crust type people in my mind. Clams are for blue collar types.
Now the thing about eating clams is that, in order to eat them, you have to open them. Elise and I do a surf and turf dinner at our house for our anniversary every year and clams are always the appetizer of choice. But you have to open them…separate out the edible flesh inside from the shell on the outside. To the uninitiated, you look at a clam and there does not appear to be any discernible means of getting into the delicacy. There is a reason we use the phrase “clam up” when asking someone to cease speaking.
Enter the CLAM KNIFE. This tool has a unique thin edge on one side and blunt on the other allowing a person to place the edge into the barely noticeable crack running around the shell. The blunt side permits using the palm of your hand to press the knife into that slit and pry the shell open revealing the heavenly mollusk inside. Separating the edible from the inedible. Thank God for clam knives…although not from the clam’s perspective I guess.
I bring up clam knives because I know very little about the two edged sword mentioned in today’s first reading from Hebrews. It has been quite awhile since I have armed myself for battle with what I imagine to be a heavy, deadly weapon. And knights have never been the same since this sword has gone out of favor. So, I figured using the clam knife analogy would be a bit more to my understanding and experience. How is this for a alternate first line from Hebrews:
“The word of God is living and effective,
sharper than any clam knife,
penetrating even between soul and spirit,
joints and marrow…”
Either way, knife or sword, what does the line really mean. Soul and spirit. Joints and marrow. I guess, the way I see it, the author is talking about using the Word of God (Jesus Christ, the Living Word) as a means of separating virtue from evil. To pare out from our being those things that cause us to stumble and separate us from God. To eliminate the inedible shell from the flesh of the clam on the inside. As an example from Scripture, we can look at the readings from Jesus being tempted in the desert by Satan in Matthew’s Gospel 4:1-11. As Satan tells a fasting Jesus to turn the stones into bread, Jesus responds with this verse from Deuteronomy:
“It is written: One does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes forth from the mouth of God.”
Satan wants Jesus to use His powers for selfish reasons and Jesus puts the focus back on worshiping God by use the Word of God. Thus highlighting humility and taking away the potential sin of pride.
Satan then asks Jesus to throw Himself down from the walls of the temple challenging God to supply His angels to save Jesus from death. But Jesus responds again with a quote from Deuteronomy emphasizing that faith comes before miracles:
“You shall not put the Lord your God to the test”
Finally, Satan promises Jesus the world. And Jesus, sticking to His reading from Chapter 6 of Deuteronomy, that we cannot accept promises on Satan’s terms:
“The Lord, your God, shall you worship and him alone shall you serve.”
In The Chosen, during Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, he directs His words individually to His disciples:
To Simon the Zealot (who had fought violently against the Romans) – Do not resist the evil one. Offer your other cheek
To Tamar (the bejeweled Ethiopian woman) – Do not worry about what you will wear each day. God clothes the lilies in the fields who neither spin or toil. Will He not do greater than this for you.
To Matthew, the hated tax collector, who Jesus calls in today’s Gospel – Blessed are you when other revile and persecute you, for your reward will be great in heaven.
And, finally, John the Baptist is in prison speaking to Andrew – John asks Andrew what Jesus said during the sermon but, more importantly, what did Jesus say to Andrew directly. Something that stuck with Andrew. Andrew responds “can you add a single hour to your life by being anxious? Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.”
In each of these examples, God’s Word holds a lesson for each individual. Highlighting and illustrating where the weakness lies, pointing the way to moving closer to the image and likeness of Our Lord. We only need to listen and, more importantly, to act. To build our houses on rock and not on sand.
Andrew asks John what he should do now. He responds to Andrew:
“If you want to help me, Go home and do what He says”
To listen to the word of God like you were wielding a clam knife. Separate out the edible from the inedible. The wheat from the chaff. The sheep from the goats. Penetrating down to the joint and the marrow. The soul and the spirit. Good from Evil. Life from Death.
