You complete me

Twenty Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

For those who had lived through the 90s, Jerry Maguire must have been one of the most iconic romantic movies of all times. I know that most Gen Z’s would be scratching their heads, “Jerry Who?” It starred Tom Cruise, most famous for his looks than his acting skills, next to an almost unknown actress. The most famous tagline of the movie became one of the most popular “pick-up” lines used to express one’s undying love and desperate need for the other - “You complete me!” It sounds so awesomely romantic to literally be unable to live without someone because a part of you is missing. I mean, you can’t get more Romeo-and-Juliet than that, right? Like, let me drink poison if we can’t be together so I won’t ever have to live without you and I would literally rather die than live without you because You… Complete…Me.

The tagline may not have been that original as it draws inspiration from the Jewish mystical tradition, that each person possesses half a soul and it is only when they have found the other half of their soul in a person whom they will spend their entire lives with, will the two halves be reunited and made whole, thus the man and the woman “complete” each other. That’s a beautiful way of describing the complementarity of husband and wife but it is far from our Christian understanding of marriage and the person. A man does not complete a woman nor a woman a man in marriage. If this were so, then they can also choose to end this union as quickly and simply as they had sealed it. Rather, it is as our Lord reminds us, “what God has united, man must not divide.” We are, in fact, full persons, created in the image of God in need of no one but Jesus Christ. It is He who completes us!

Jerry Maguire might be right about one thing—Yes, we are incomplete people. But it’s not because we’re unmarried or that we have yet to find the other half of our soul. It’s because God has “put eternity in the heart of man” (Ecclesiastes 3:11) and that “His invisible attributes…have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world” (Romans 1:19-20). Without Him, we are incomplete, lacking something, missing a critical part of our soul. Notice that when God is absent in our lives, we will always try to fill that bottomless hole and make up for that inexhaustible absence with other things - things which can provide temporary relief but continue to remind us of what is perennially missing and which can only be satiated by God and God alone. And until He is the one to fill that hole, you’ll be incomplete. If there is one line which can utterly beat the Jerry Maguire line it should be this famous quote from St Augustine: “(O God) you have made us and drawn us to yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”

One of the ways our Lord completes someone is by giving him a “helpmate.” In response to Adam’s lonely plight, God created for him an “ezer” translated as “helpmate.” The English translation is inadequate and, in our day, we may use the word “helper” in the sense of a maid, a domestic helper. But that is far from the meaning of the Hebrew word used to describe the first woman in the first reading. This is not the only occasion where the Hebrew word appears. In fact, it appears 21 times in total in the Old Testament. In two cases it refers to the first woman, Eve. Three times it refers to powerful nations Israel called on for help when besieged. In the sixteen remaining cases the word refers to God as our help. He is the one who comes alongside us in our helplessness.

This last reference of the noun “ezer” provides us with the context of how to understand the other instances when the word is used. It does not suggest 'helper' as in 'servant,' but help, saviour, rescuer, protector as in 'God is our help.' In no other occurrence in the Old Testament does this refer to an inferior, but always to a superior or an equal...'help' expresses that the woman is a help/strength who rescues or saves man. The woman was not created to serve the man, but to serve WITH the man. Without the woman, the man was only half the story. She was not an afterthought or an optional adjunct to an independent, self-sufficient man. God said in Genesis 2:18 that without her, the man's condition was "not good." God's intention in creating the woman for the man was for the two to be partners in stewarding God's creation.

Therefore, all of you are to be a helpmate to each other for so much more than mere intimate friendship and companionship. The old penny Catechism reminds us that we are created solely for God and for heaven – to know God, to love Him, to serve Him and be with Him in Paradise forever. If this is life’s main purpose, and it is truly a tall order, then we seriously are in need of help. The good news is that God gives us that help, but He also provides help, for most people, through a spouse, a friend, a community member, or a priest. God has created each of us not as lone travellers but ‘indispensable companions’ in our journey to heaven. The purpose of that helpmate must be to help us achieve the main purpose of our lives NOT to accomplish our own selfish, self-centred and myopic agendas. We are to help each other worship, obey, love God and be with Him in Paradise forever. We are to help each other get to heaven. In the case of a marriage, if this doesn’t become a couple’s life project, they may actually end up dragging each other to hell.

Finding a lifelong friend or being married, doesn’t mean that you’ve exorcised loneliness into the furthest regions of the universe. The spectre of loneliness trails many good couples and plagues even the best of marriages and friendships. And loneliness may often tempt us to find false substitutes in adulterous relationships, pornography, addictions and workaholism. Where does such loneliness come from? Well, we return to the story in Genesis. In the beginning, it was a literal paradise of fulfilling relationships as God in an unhindered way walked with Adam and Eve in the garden and they enjoyed the fullest experience of intimacy with each other. But how did the demon of loneliness infect their hearts? Well, the simple answer is sin – disobedience to God’s will and purpose. Sin is refusing to allow God to “complete” us. Notice how Adam and Eve hid from God out of fear of getting caught, and Adam blamed Eve for his disobedience, which clearly drove a wedge into their flawless intimacy. And the deep fellowship on every satisfying level is now replaced by alienation, blame, distrust, and shame.

The lesson here is huge. Living a God-less life ultimately leads us to a love-less life. Living for what’s “best for me,” while ignoring the needs, wishes, and interests of others always brings alienation and aloneness. Thank God that He has made a way for us to restore relationships and to recapture a portion of the intimacy of Eden. When we follow the way of Jesus and live to love and serve others, aloneness gives way to intimacy and our self-serving acts of alienation dissolve into a profound bonding that reflects the complete and perfect harmony of the Three Persons of the Most Holy Trinity. Between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit there exists no conflict of will, no battle for dominance, no petty struggle to be identified or appreciated independently of the other. There exists only the perfect communion of love, and a blessed oneness of purpose and intent and action. Without Him, we will continue to be restless and listless, for only God can complete us, you and me.