Sunday January 30

Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time

 

Jesus Asks for Prophets Like Himself

            We know we are willing to listen to people as long as they tell us what pleases us, what conforms to our own ways of thinking. But when they remind us of things, even good things, that make demands on us or upset our patterns of thinking and doing things, we close our ears and hearts. Yet it is good that Jesus reminds us of things that shake up our conscience when we neglect to do them: like forgiving, caring for the poor, standing up for what is right and just. Let us listen today to the Lord and to all that speak in his name.

 

First Reading: Jeremiah 1:4-5,17-19

This is what God said:

“Before I shaped you in the womb,
    I knew all about you.
Before you saw the light of day,
    I had holy plans for you:
A prophet to the nations—
    that’s what I had in mind for you.”

“But you—up on your feet and get dressed for work!
    Stand up and say your piece. Say exactly what I tell you to say.
Don’t pull your punches
    or I’ll pull you out of the lineup.

 “Stand at attention while I prepare you for your work.
    I’m making you as impregnable as a castle,
Immovable as a steel post,
    solid as a concrete block wall.
You’re a one-man defense system
    against this culture,
Against Judah’s kings and princes,
    against the priests and local leaders.
They’ll fight you, but they won’t
    even scratch you.
I’ll back you up every inch of the way.”
    God’s Decree.

 

Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 12:31–13:13

And yet some of you keep competing for so-called “important” parts.

But now I want to lay out a far better way for you.

 If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.

If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing.

If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.

Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.

When I was an infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.

We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!

But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.

 

Gospel: Luke 4:21-30

He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the assistant, and sat down. Every eye in the place was on him, intent. Then he started in, “You’ve just heard Scripture make history. It came true just now in this place.”

All who were there, watching and listening, were surprised at how well he spoke. But they also said, “Isn’t this Joseph’s son, the one we’ve known since he was a youngster?”

He answered, “I suppose you’re going to quote the proverb, ‘Doctor, go heal yourself. Do here in your hometown what we heard you did in Capernaum.’ Well, let me tell you something: No prophet is ever welcomed in his hometown. Isn’t it a fact that there were many widows in Israel at the time of Elijah during that three and a half years of drought when famine devastated the land, but the only widow to whom Elijah was sent was in Sarepta in Sidon? And there were many lepers in Israel at the time of the prophet Elisha but the only one cleansed was Naaman the Syrian.”

That set everyone in the meeting place seething with anger. They threw him out, banishing him from the village, then took him to a mountain cliff at the edge of the village to throw him to his doom, but he gave them the slip and was on his way.

 

Prayer

Lord God, our Father,
you speak to us today
the demanding words of the gospel
of Jesus your Son.
Let these not be words
coming from a distant past.
Let them be words that shock us now
out of the petty peace with ourselves.
Make us see the signs and needs of our times
and help us to speak without fear
with the living words of our lives
the message of truth and justice and love
of Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

 

Reflection:

The message of mercy is often pushed down the cliff.

For three Sundays in this year, the liturgy brought to us the events of Jesus visiting Nazareth and announcing his Mission in the synagogue for our reflection. Perhaps the Church is trying hard to drive home the central message of the Gospel that is evident, but we often miss it: the messages of mercy, freedom, healing and grace. This grace manifests itself as love. Unfortunately, the world fears this love. It rises, takes love out of the town, to the edge of the hill, wanting to push it down the cliff. The evangelist speaks of the villagers rejecting Jesus and wanting to kill him. What made the people of his hometown so angry?

The text used by Jesus from the book of Isaiah was a well-known text, one of the most read, known to all. Where does the irritation of the listeners originate? It was because Jesus did not read the text in full but stopped it halfway! “…He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives … and a year of grace…” and there he stopped. And the people expected him to continue reading from the passage which they were so sure of: (Is. 61:2) “… and the day of vengeance of our God.” Jesus did not say this.

They were a people who had suffered greatly, oppressed by the Assyrians and the
Babylonians. They expected the vengeance of God against the pagans who had oppressed them for so many centuries. Now they are under the rule of the Romans. They sincerely desired for the vengeance of God. But Jesus announces a time of grace – not vengeance.

But Jesus calls us to be merciful and kind. “For if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them.” That is the challenge Jesus poses before us.

If you do good to those who are good, what good do you do for free? But Jesus proposes a life of gratuity. Why do you do good? Because you have received the nature of a Father who does only good. “Love your enemies.” Do good for free, and you will be children of the Most High because He shows his gratuity to us, who do not deserve it, to the ungrateful, to the wicked. This is the ‘grace’. The inhabitants of Nazareth could not accept this message of mercy. And today, we find it easier to be friends of villagers of Narareth than being a friend of Jesus.

People have their expectations of their priests and preachers. Sometimes it is thought that a capable evangelist does not provoke, does not disturb but always says what people like to hear. But, the evangelist’s aim is not to please people. He must announce the Word of Christ, not what people expect.

 

Video available on Youtube: The message of mercy is often pushed down the cliff.