SENT IN POVERTY

September 22, Wednesday

TWENTY-FIFTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

 

      In his prayer of penance Ezra focuses his attention more on the goodness of God and his constant forgiveness notwithstanding the infidelities of his people, rather than on people’s sinfulness. Sin should make us turn to God in humility rather than make us withdraw within ourselves. We are what we are by what the Bible calls God’s mercy, this is, not only compassion and forgiveness, but also tenderness, pity, clemency, goodness, fidelity. It also demands that people must have that attitude towards others that God shows towards them.

      Luke, more than the other evangelists, stresses the poverty of the apostle and thus spiritualizes the mission of the herald of the gospel. Still, he has to take people in the concrete. They are to be healed from illness, which expresses the power of evil over sinful humanity; for the Bible considers sickness a consequence of sin through this link: that the spiritual illness of sin leads to physical illness. The apostle, then, must go to the whole person in a spirit of poverty. All he has to offer is the good news, and nothing may obscure it.

 

First Reading: Ezra 9:5-9

At the evening sacrifice I picked myself up from my utter devastation, and in my ripped clothes and cape fell to my knees and stretched out my hands to God, my God. And I prayed:

“My dear God, I’m so totally ashamed, I can’t bear to face you. O my God—our iniquities are piled up so high that we can’t see out; our guilt touches the skies. We’ve been stuck in a muck of guilt since the time of our ancestors until right now; we and our kings and priests, because of our sins, have been turned over to foreign kings, to killing, to captivity, to looting, and to public shame—just as you see us now.

“Now for a brief time God, our God, has allowed us, this battered band, to get a firm foothold in his holy place so that our God may brighten our eyes and lighten our burdens as we serve out this hard sentence. We were slaves; yet even as slaves, our God didn’t abandon us. He has put us in the good graces of the kings of Persia and given us the heart to build The Temple of our God, restore its ruins, and construct a defensive wall in Judah and Jerusalem.

 

Gospel: Luke 9:1-6

Jesus now called the Twelve and gave them authority and power to deal with all the demons and cure diseases. He commissioned them to preach the news of God’s kingdom and heal the sick. He said, “Don’t load yourselves up with equipment. Keep it simple; you are the equipment. And no luxury inns—get a modest place and be content there until you leave. If you’re not welcomed, leave town. Don’t make a scene. Shrug your shoulders and move on.”

Commissioned, they left. They traveled from town to town telling the latest news of God, the Message, and curing people everywhere they went.

 

Prayer

Lord our God,
your mercy extends to everyone.
Let your missionary Church go out to all
without any self-imposed, useless baggage
that obscures the pure message of the gospel
but with great humility before the good will
and the hospitality of people.
May thus our receptivity to people
make them in turn receptive to the good news
of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

 

Reflection:

We are missionaries

We read from chapter 9 of the Gospel of Luke today with Jesus sending his chosen Twelve on their mission.

A pile of wood does not create a fire if there are no flames. In the same way, no matter how many Christians gather together, there is no church if there is no mission. Jesus gathered the twelve disciples around him not for protection, nor for pleasant company. Following Jesus is with the purpose of the mission to the world.

 

Jesus entrusted the twelve with tasks that were beyond their skills. An employer hires an employee for the skills he has. The employer gives him tasks that are within his ability to fulfill. But that wasn’t the case with Jesus. But, fortunately, Jesus was employing these Twelve for work that was well beyond their existing skills, work they were not capable of doing.

 

Imagine, if the salvation of the world depended on the ability or the talents of us, Christians, or the other Christians we have known, then pity the state of this world! But Christian mission is not about our hard work, our learning, our talents, our programs. Rather, it is about the power of God at work, and Jesus promised his disciples that power.

 

The Twelve were tasked with a four-fold mission: To Drive out demons – and set people free spiritually; to Cure diseases – and set people free physically; to Proclaim the kingdom of God – beyond the boundaries of a place, a territory, or an organization and to Heal the.

 

Entrusting the disciples with this task also meant they were to go and find people in need, to visit people in their towns, heal the sick, preach the kingdom, and be his apostle to them. The power was given to them, not to sit down on the nearest rock and invite anyone who wanted to hear what they had to say to come and sit at their feet.

 

This is the message that we must carry home today. The Mission entrusted to us today is to go out – do not stay put – but to go out in search of people who are in need of physical and spiritual healing, freedom from the bondage of sinful habits, behaviors, and attitudes. Waiting for people to find their way to us is not a model Jesus either practiced or taught.

 

How far will we be able to carry out this task, because Jesus also commands: “Take nothing for the journey.” Wrong question to ask! He wants us to trust in his providence. The one who entrusted us with the mission also has given us the power to do the task. Do not doubt his powers!

 

Video available on Youtube: We are missionaries