Paul's Reflections 15th January, 2012. Homily Second Sunday of the Year - B

Homily Second Sunday of the Year - B 15th January, 2012     

P Save a tree. Don't print this e-mail unless it's really necessary

v  FIRST READING. 1 Samuel 3:3b-10, 193:3b-10, 19

v  SECOND READING. 1 Corinthians 6:13c-15a, 17-20

v  GOSPEL  Cycle B. John 1:35-42

I noticed something unusual about the gospel this weekend.  There is something a little unclear about it.  John is speaking with two of his own disciples and says: LOOK, THERE is the Lamb of God ! (Which, we now know is short-hand for… Look!...There is the one who is was to come;  and who will be the perfect, unblemished sacrifice to take away the sins of the world and restore our right-relationship with God as not only God’s people, but as sons and daughters of God).

The two disciples immediately take off and follow Jesus and he invites them to stay with him. To really become disciples and followers of Jesus, we have to be close to him, and live with him, and learn from him; how he thinks, what he values, what he does not approve of, and so on.  We need to walk his walk and not just talk his talk.  It took years of walking and living in Jesus’ community, for the disciples to even begin to understand who he was and what his message was about. They often got it wrong or half-right, and thank goodness they had Jesus there, as the teacher, to sr them straight and deepen their learning.

What I find intriguing is that one disciple definitely follows Jesus, but the other… what becomes of the second.  Perhaps he followed Jesus too, but the story isn’t about him. OR perhaps he saw where Jesus lived and went back to John.  It would seem hard to comprehend to us that someone might see what Jesus has to offer and not accept it, but there were many people in Jesus’ time who were affronted by Jesus and rejected him because his message was too challenging and too radical and at other times, not what they expected the messiah and the chosen one to be LIKE.   So, it’s a reminder, many are called, but few are chosen. Many ae invited but not all accept.   Jesus understood this difficulty because he witnessed people stopping following him. He warned his followers to count the cost of their discipleship and not be wishy-washy, because there is no time to “umm and ahhh” when the work of the Kingdom is urgent!!

Jesus calls us all to the primary vocation of being servants and disciples of Christ in our daily lives and work. We achieve this by staying very close to Jesus in prayer, in scripture reflection, in reading about the teachings of Christ, in worshipping regularly at church and learning from the teachings of our church too.  Christ must live in and with us, as we with him!  It is that deep a connection that we are called into.

Each one of us is still called by Jesus. And our response, like Samuel, is ‘here I am, Lord, I come to do your will!” 

The Church, obedient to the message and gospel of Jesus, is  such a challenging and insightful teacher for us and for the wider community in this age as in ages past.  As Jesus’ message was challenging and instructive of God’s ways and not merely human ways, so too the church and its members also seek to follow.   In this day and age, the message of Christ is needed more than ever, and yet in some ways, it is so different and foreign to some of the values and ways of looking at things.  It is not an easy job to explain the complexity and radicalness of Jesus message;  yet, in other ways it is;  ultimately it is about faithfulness to God’s will in the world, which is to build up a people who live and breath God’s unconditional love and care for all people and for the world we live in.  People who aren’t about ‘me first’ or ‘what’s right for me’  but rather, ‘what’s right for God and what’s best for all.” 

Just as Jesus received opposition and misunderstanding and rejection, so too the church can expect the same. But it keeps persisting in the message.  

Christ and his church, have a rather powerful and different view of the human person and the human body, than does the “modern”  thinking of some sectors of the world. St Paul sums up this gospel-focused understanding:  The body is not meant for fornication; it is for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. ……You know, surely, that your bodies are members making up the body of Christ; anyone who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him. Keep away from fornication. All the other sins are committed outside the body; but to fornicate is to sin against your own body. Your body, you know, is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you since you received him from God. You are not your own property; you have been bought and paid for. That is why you should use your body for the glory of God.

So it is a positive and encouraging teaching. To put ourselves:  mind, body and Spirit, at the service of God.  Our lives are to be lived with attention to not so much ‘rights’  but ‘responsibilities.’   I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that this world makes too much of things such as sexual relations, to the point where they are removed out of their proper context of the marriage (and of fostering love between husband and wife), and in creating and nurturing families. To some values of the world, it is something recreational and disconnected from the holistic picture presented in the gospel.   Physical relations, in the Christian vision are not described in terms of a human right of all people to do “this or that” or “to do as I please, for it’s my body”, but rather the gospel vision is of a carefully treasured gift and responsibility to be exercised within the proper context. Why?  Because, our lives are now lived IN CHRIST and our lives, our work, our bodies, our thoughts and actions are all for the Lord; and part of the body of Christ. This becomes a precious moral compass, whenever we are faced with any challenging moral questions. What can I do, what ought I do, what do I really NEED to do, as opposed to what do I WANT to do?  All are called (in situations where there is a moral dilemma), to lovingly and faithfully avoid anything that is not necessary for the building up of the Body of Christ and the building up of God’s Kingdom. This is only being truthful to the profound reality that we are truly temples of the Holy Spirit.