Walking with Jesus: 15th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Amos 7:12-15; Ephesians 1:3-14; Mark 6, 7:1-13

I like to reflect on where I’ve been and where I’m headed …hopefully in gratitude for God’s help and gifts, whether I’m aware of them or not … kinda attuned to God … or not aware of God at all. I live my daily life with an agenda which is often packed with non-essentials. I focus my attention on them while putting off or disregarding what God needs of me each day. Like many, I make a list of priorities: Take care of the family … make a good living … be kind and respectful … respond in love and try to be considerate of others when I can. Most of all, love my immediate family. But does it ever occur to me that I have to lead all with whom I interact to heaven and a deeper knowledge, appreciation and love for God, our creator, redeemer and friend? The objection is the oft-used and misused “I don’t have the time.” Besides, isn’t this the role of the bishop, priests, diaconate community, religious ... those who do this job for a living? Isn’t it the job of those who work for the Church which I support generously? Don’t I have my own priorities which are different? I can always pray for them! The readings help us with this dilemma.

Amos was a shepherd from Judah, the Southern kingdom. He received a call from God to be a prophet by way of many visions during the reign of the prosperous but faithless Jeroboam. Amos had been preaching in Bethel, an important religious site north of Jerusalem that featured the worship of a golden calf. Just like Moses in the desert, Amos was saying that this was not true worship: It was idolatry. The king didn’t want to hear this. Politically, King Jeroboam wanted the people to worship God in Bethel and not in the temple in Jerusalem so that he would have more control over them. Amaziah, a priest in Bethel, demanded that Amos leave and never presume to speak the word of God since he was a “paid prophet.”

Amos was sent by God to preach the truth about how far the king and people had drifted away from God. Amos proclaimed that God was the one who would set the people straight. The day of Yahweh would be a day of darkness and not light. Even though the royal house would fall along with the false sanctuary, and the people would be led to captivity, God would send a savior. This was too much for the people, and they expelled Amos from the area. Amos knew that divine punishment is never completely destructive; it is part of the hidden plan of God to bring salvation to all creation.

The king, priests and people wanted the convenience of worshipping in Bethel rather than traveling all the way to Jerusalem. Today we can identify with this ideal since the bishops have dispensed people from attending Mass due to Covid. The global pandemic has brought many challenges; now we are faced with the challenge of returning to a closer, increased presence in our worship of the Lord. Am I listening to the Lord, or to what is convenient? Am I loving? Am I worshipping the Lord in gratitude?

Paul brings us into focus with God’s divine plan which the Church was formed to announce. He uses the language of being chosen and called to be holy and without blemish. God has redeemed us in Christ and forgiven us because God’s grace leads us to Him. This is for a larger purpose: to bring all people to the knowledge of God’s love, to live this love and to be forever in heaven with God, who is love. So the Church is not just a collection of people but a people called by God for a purpose: to live, love and bring God’s plan that all be in heaven.

Our “job” is no different than the “job” Jesus gives the 12 apostles in today’s gospel: Jesus sends them out with authority to do mighty deeds. They are taking almost nothing with them, which means they have to trust in the protective care of God. This means that they are not seeking power, possession, pleasure or prestige from their work because this is God’s plan:  to bring all people to God, God’s love and God’s home for all, heaven.

What did Amos bring with him to go to Bethel? Maybe a rolled-up mat, fruit and water? He did bring the essential things: love of God and a mission from God. In our job, we are called most importantly to bring Jesus and His love. In Exploring the Sunday Readings, Alice Camille writes:

We’re just marginal Catholics, churchgoers when it’s safe to go, collectors of the occasional sacrament, basically good people. We don’t break the Commandments (much). We do our duty (more or less). We believe in God (even if we don’t trust God absolutely and with everything we’ve got). All of that is enough to get us within shouting distance of the gates of the kingdom. But if we want to actually enter that kingdom, we have to pick up that stick and start walking where Jesus is walking. No one who does this is ever left wanting.

So I reflect on:

• I am free to choose whether to serve others or myself, to give glory to God or myself, to follow God’s purpose or my own. What would I do today? Why?
• How has God’s grace warmed my life? Has God healed others through me?
  

Sacred Space 2021 states:

“Jesus promised to be with His disciples to the end of time. The Church He founded has lived through all sorts of challenging times. Many of its members have brought little credit to their great baptismal calling. This should not come as so great a surprise. As the prolific English author Gilbert Keith Chesterton once put it, Jesus did not found a Church for good men. He founded a Church for all men. So we should not be surprised to find many in it who are anything but good.

“In sending out His disciples two by two, as the Gospel records, Jesus knew exactly what He was doing. The vast majority of those He has sent out have been married couples. His plan of salvation depends on them, and it will still be so until the end of time.”