Walking with Jesus: 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Jeremiah 1:4-5,17-19; 1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13; Luke 4:21-30

If you’ve a chance to read today’s Scripture passages before hearing them proclaimed in Church or reading this blog, your general reaction should be that these words are pleasing and engaging, care-filled and beautiful – with a message that is completely pertinent to our lives as Christians today. Are they? Do the last two sentences of the Gospel question my assessment? “When the people in the synagogue heard this, they were all filled with fury. The rose up, drove Him (Jesus) out of the town, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which their town had been built, to hurl Him down headlong. But Jesus passed through the midst of them and went away.” [Luke 4:28-30]

Their anger – better, their rage – infuriated Jesus’ hometown neighbors into an uncontrollable mob set on killing Him right then and there. Why? Where did this come from? This was a dramatic change of mood. The people had second thoughts about Jesus. They had grudges ... expecting Him to work some of His astounding miracles here, more than He had in Capernaum. And Jesus slighted them even more: “Amen, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in His own native place.” [Luke 4:24]

The book of Jeremiah opens with him receiving his call to be a prophet at a young age. “The word of the Lord came to me, saying: ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I dedicated you, a prophet to the nations I appointed you.’” [Jeremiah 1:4-5] After years of reflecting on Scriptures and reading and listening to sermons, we know that our birth was no accident. God has chosen each of us and called us specifically by our Baptism to be people of love, caring, forgiving, and being a sign of Jesus’ love to the world we live in. His opening words are comforting. What lies ahead? Jeremiah confronts the Babylonians’ total assault on Jerusalem. The final reduction of the Holy City to rubble and the deportation and flight of the people is a sudden reversal of the once-beloved people of God. They had persistently failed to live up to God’s covenant commands and be His people of example and love, dedicated to Him. The final chapter of his book describes this tragedy in graphic detail:  the breaking down of the Temple's impregnable outer walls and its ultimate dismantling, followed by the burning of the city. Why has this happened? Has God forgotten them? Have they forgotten God? Have they lived as God’s people, or as a people set in their own individual ways of living and acting?

Paul has been addressing a number of issues affecting the way the Corinthian community has been worshipping: their dress and decorum, their celebration of the Lord’s Supper, and the unity and variety of Spiritual gifts. There were divisions among this Christian community on social and economic grounds; i.e., wealthy Christians hosted great meals at which the poor were either not welcomed or were subject to ridicule. There were divisions based on competition for the higher gifts. I have higher and more special gifts because of who I am. I’m naturally more important to God. WE HAVE BEEN DISTRACTED IN UNDERSTANDING THE TRUTHS OF PAUL’S MESSAGE because we have heard, even chosen this passage for our own wedding or our children’s. This passage talks of love. We want to hear all about love … BUT love is an action word. Paul ends all comparisons and honor seeking: Love remains the most important of the spiritual gifts in the Church. Love is an expression of God’s own love, enabling all to act mercifully and kindly toward one another. Love is always at the service of others and is the essential message of the gospel. GOD LOVES you and me. He tells us: He is patient, He is kind, He isn’t jealous, He is not self-important, not insolent, does not keep account of evil. Love is what life is all about because it mirrors God’s love. Jesus consistently showed love throughout His life – miracles, teachings, forgiving and caring for all. His Gospel teaching is a socially inclusive Gospel, one for all cultures and all times. It is a Gospel of the wideness of the heart of God in contrast to the narrowness of His Jewish listeners. Am I listening?

In his poem We and They, Rudyard Kipling wrote of English narrowmindedness in his time: “All the people like us are We, And everyone else is They.” The Jews of Jeremiah’s, Paul’s and Jesus’ time followed this view of “us and them” with regard to themselves and the hated Gentiles.  

So I reflect on:

• Am I afflicted with the “us and them” mentality?
• Am I afflicted with it in terms of myself and immigrants, migrant workers, people of color, single parents, the homeless, and every upstanding fellow citizen who just happens to live on the wrong side of the tracks, or is in the wrong political party or religion, or has no religion?
• Will I ever stop this social and un-Christian snobbery?
  

Sacred Space 2022 states:

“Why did the assembly turn on Jesus? Simply because what He said about the prophets Elijah and Elisha implied that God’s offer of salvation was no longer restricted to Jews but extended to Gentiles as well.  Such an implication was anathema to those who thought of themselves as God’s ‘chosen people.’

Is my Christian belief so restricted that I fail to see that God’s choice is wider than mine?

“Today’s Gospel call us to embrace Jesus’ vision of a world remade in everyday expressions of hope, compassion and justice that are the first signs of the coming of God’s Kingdom.” [Connections 1/30/22]