Paul's Reflections 25th Sunday ordinary time A

21st September, 2008      25th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year A

 

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-        The work of the Kingdom is urgent, and important, and the labourers are few, the harvest plentiful… in fact, it’s more than plentiful…. the harvest God intends is that everyone (absolutely everyone) be included as part of God’s kingdom…. so there is no time like the present, no time for hesitation…..  all hands on deck…..  everyone is needed…….. all are called….

-        God is calling people to ‘be about his work’ that others would not employ…..(never even dream of employing)…….   God can see usefulness… and importance in all people; even people that others reject, ridicule, ignore, and overlook…

-        Envy…..   everyone got what they needed, but not everyone got what they wanted, nor what they expected…..// expectations play an important role…..  in a sense of satisfaction or dissatisfaction……

-        I can remember in incident many years ago, when I was working in St Stephens cathedral in Brisbane…..  I was looking after the cathedral… and also the sacristan for masses  at the cathedral…   it was a Friday afternoon mass…    and many people in town would go to the Friday afternoon mass and not go to Sunday mass, so it was like an alternate Sunday mass for people… so the cathedral had a collection in mass even though it was a weekday mass….  anyway….  this one Friday, the administrator of the cathedral said that someone would come by to pick up a key to the church at St Patricks the valley (about ten minutes down the road),…..for a wedding rehearsal… they would come by some time… and I was to hand this person this key….. but they never came…..  anyways… I went on to my next task at the cathedral…. To be sacristan for the mass …….I was at the late afternoon mass, in the assembly, participating in the mass…  as one of the people…. (this happened before I was ordained)….….  and it was around the gifts time when the bread and wine is brought forward…..…  and a collection plate went around….  and after they take up the collection the collectors would lock the collection in the sacristy so no one would steal it…..   this person came up to me and I thought,…  they are looking for the key to the sacristy to lock the collection away… so, in mainly non verbal gestures… and only some words, since it was in the middle of mass.. I gestured. to him…  (with a wave of the key… and thumbs up and pointing to him and him pointing to the key… and me nodding and him nodding back…. And I was saying….  … so I thought……are you looking for the key to the sacristy to lock the collection away…..….  I showed him the key… he nodded… and I said…’for the….” and he nodded and said yes and then took the key and walked straight out the front door…. I was confused….that’s odd…. why did he go that way….why did he just walk out the front door of the church…… why didn’t he go to the sacristy….  what was happening….. and then it dawned on me…. oh no…….   I had just handed the key to the cathedral to the man who had come for the church key for st Patricks in the valley… and he has not walked out the door gotten in a car and driven off to the valley…..   and that is how I managed to lock everyone out of half the cathedral/… that day…….    I couldn’t believe the freak coincidence…. and the similarity of the two purposes had led to an assumption that proved very wrong…..  the rehearsal people now had a key that did not work in the valley church….   no one could get back into the sacristy of the cathedral…. and we couldn’t get back into the room that would allow us to turn any lights out or set any alarms in the cathedral…. or secure the building…….and the priest couldn’t get back in the sacristy… it was a minor disaster…. but very, very funny in hindsight…. 

 

and what it really brought home to me was, even when we think we are on the same wavelength with others….   a whole series of assumptions can still be totally different even if we are going…  ‘you want the… ‘ yeah, that’s right,… the “….   is this the….  “  “yeah, that;s the…..’,,,,,  great then I’ll…. “   …. ‘sure you can…..”       (but… ‘what, where, when, how why … is all just assumed….. and may often be assumed wrongly….)……

 

this happened in the gospel…..    people assumed that since they worked all day, they would be getting more than the ones who worked an hour……     have you ever wondered why the landowner didn’t just pay the day long workers first…and send them home  and then quietly pay the latecomers the same…..   why did he do it in that order…. so that the longer workers would SEE the action….  its because it’s a parable… and a confounding story at that…..   the reason its given in that order is because they needed to see the difference so that the different ways and thoughts of God from ourselves could be revealed…..  

 

how many of some daily hurts, disappointments and turmoils really come from the fact that we have filled our thoughts with wrong assumptions, unreal expectations and unrealistic constructs of thinking…… 

 

Jesus offers us a new and exciting path….   of graciousness, kindness and giving that does not stop to count the cost, but responds from love and true need….  and is humble and meek in the good sense of the word…..   able to know where we really stand with God and with eachother….  and being grateful for God’s generosity and love to all…..  no matter where they seem to come in the pecking order….

 

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