Imagine with me this scene. You are lost in the woods, disoriented because it all looks the same, you can’t find your trail map. What do you do? Most of us will begin to feel some level of panic, some will begin to run in different directions trying to find the way back, maybe the more experienced hiker will read the stars and moss on the tree. For most of us, our fear and panic will force us to sit down and wait, to hope that someone will know we are lost and call the rangers.
Our life of faith is the same. Like the lost sheep, we run from one thing to another trying to find peace, hope, joy and find that whatever it is will works for a little while and then stop, so we eventually run to something else. God will continue to search us out, even if we don’t want to be found. Eventually, we run out of options and sit down, and God is right there waiting to pick us up, heal us and bring us home. What greater happiness can there be!
Our God is a patient God. He will wait for us even though His heart is longing for us to be home with him. Like the father in the third parable, God waits for us to come home and will embrace us no matter what we may have done or the choices we have made. The younger son and the older son both treated the father with great disrespect. By demanding his inheritance, the younger son treated his father as if he was dead. The older son yells at him and treats him like he is a servant. Unfortunately, we treat God the same way. He looks for us, he loves us, he is always there for us, and we treat him as if he is dead, only turning to him when we need something. Like the older brother, we demand an answer to a prayer that we want  exactly the way we want it, then we get angry with him when we don’t get our way.  We stamp our feet like little children.  We walk away from him when he expects us to actually live the Gospel message. However,  the father of the parable, God sits and waits with a longing and loving heart. He searches for us like a shepherd looking for a lost sheep. He rejoices like the woman who has found the coin.
So, my brothers and sisters, we can try to find our own way and rely only on our selves or we can sit down and allow ourselves to be found. God is looking for you and me: will you let him find you? God is sitting looking down the road and awaiting your return: Isn’t it time to come home? We are all the lost sheep, we are all the coin that was lost, and we are both brothers. And yet, God loves us all.

Jesus echoes the same sentiment I hear from many people in the church world today and one I have. How do we get more people involved in the life of the parish? Where are many of our young families and families with teens? Books are being written about the new evangelization and “how to’s”. There is no book that will have the answers and no program will turn the tide.
Jesus tells us what will turn the tide: a living relationship with Him and not being afraid to publicly let people know who we are, even when it means giving up our comfortable Christianity. We need to be on fire with the same Holy Spirit that He sent into the world on the Day of Pentecost and continues to send the Spirit today. It is no mistake the Spirit is depicted by fire.
What we need to do from a practical perspective is this:
• A radical commitment to Jesus and to the Gospel, not just once, but every moment of every day. Will this be easy? Jesus reminds us that a radical commitment will set us apart and even our families will not understand. This radical commitment can only be sustained by a life of prayer and the celebration of the Sacraments. This is a non-negotiable.
• A willingness to change. The Saints teach us that we need to change to have this radical commitment. St Francis of Assisi, Mother Theresa, St Oscar Romero of El Salvador. Kateri Tekawitha
• Finding ways to be put our faith into action. I don’t want anyone to think we are not doing anything. We are and we do it well! Our next step is to expand that and draw more people to Christ. What can we do as a community to go outside our doors and do for others? I have a few ideas; and so do you. Let’s make something happen!
• Finally, by using all the things we have at our hands to witness. If your call is to stand and preach on the street, go for it. For most of us, it will be the witness of our actions. We can use social media: send tweet or use Instagram, Facebook, whatever else is out there. On a Sunday morning message someone and: tell them that God loves them, invite them to Mass. During the week, send a short verse of Sacred Scripture, send a snippet of something you read about faith or Jesus, etc. We see how social media can be divisive, violent and negative. Let us set the world on fire with peace and the message of Christianity using the same tools.
My brothers and sisters, as a community let us pray.

Come Holy Spirit and ignite our hearts with fire of the seven-fold gifts. Recreate our hearts and your Church. Give us the grace to radically commit ourselves to the mission to help others know and love Jesus. Help us to do the same. Send us forth from this Holy Eucharist and set the world on fire with your Divine love. Amen

What’s really important?

After reading today’s Scriptures, I have been thinking about this most of the week.  I wish I could say it was always God, but let’s be honest, it isn’t.  Some days, it is my schedule, my need to get something done, some errand I need to run, my need to do something charitable, my time especially, when I think it is being wasted, and my list continues.

What I notice in that list is the prevalence of the word, “I”.  If I hear Jesus right, what is important is putting His Father first not me, no matter what.  The parable is a striking reminder that if all the focus is me, even in ministry, then the barn I think I am filling for a rainy day is really a waste of my time.  By putting Jesus first, then everything we are about reflects His life that was spent putting the mission of the Father before anything.  He went to His Cross not to gain glory for himself, but to free you and me from death and sin.  He embraced His suffering to show us how much we are loved.  Even at that most profound moment, he even gave himself away in the mystery of the Eucharist and 2000 years later, we still experience it here at the altar of the Lord.

Even in parish life, we can get narrow sighted.  We can focus on us and what we are about forgetting our call to do the mission of Jesus.  Everything we do as a parish community should be for the honor and glory of God and not us.  I think the challenge for all of us is to look beyond ourselves and to look to that Cross and remind ourselves that our life as a community of faith is because of the one who is there.  Even after receiving Holy Communion, we need to go back to our pews and praise the God who we just received.

What gets in the way of accepting Jesus the center of our lives?  Simply, I think our pride and our need to control everything.  Our faith is a gift and not something to inflate our egos and make us better than anyone.  Putting God first is true humility.  Control is an illusion that we all fall into and the parable is the best example of that.

So, my brothers and sisters, I invite you to consider all week this simple question:

What is really important to you?  Is it Jesus or you?

 

Both readings are about hospitality. God’s and ours. In Abraham, we see God’s. He welcomes the stranger and feeds them and cares for them.  That is how God is with us. We are never turned way, but welcomed. He never lets us go hungry or in pain; he feeds and soothes us. Mary shows us the posture of being hospitable to God. We open our hearts to him and let him in. Martha got wrapped up in the details and forget to be hospitable. Mary saw what was in front of her and opened her heart. May this week be a week of hospitality. May we allow ourselves to experience God’s hospitality and be hospitable to God in our hearts and lives.

Let’s update today’s Gospel a little. “And Jesus told them”: to not carry a cell phone or a computer, look at Facebook or Twitter, just bring the clothes you are wearing, not an extra set of expensive sneakers or a nice clean change of clothes. Jesus would say: go and remind people about me because many have forgotten and if they will not listen, don’t get discouraged just keep on telling my story. He would say: Don’t boast of anything you have or own, don’t see yourself as better than others, but boast only in me and in My Cross. Tell my people about a God who loves them like a mother and longs for them to come home and be with me. Tell them about my longing that they will feed at my Table by receiving My Body and Blood; the essential food of the life of faith.
We are reminded today that the message we preach is not our own, but the message of Jesus. I am sure the 72 were afraid as they walked away and maybe even some of them got caught up in the “What ifs?” What if there is no food or it gets cold or a robber comes? What if they don’t like the message and attack us? The list of the what ifs is long and can sometimes trap us. But, if we remain focused on Jesus and him alone then we have nothing to fear. The Kingdom of heaven is not a place; but it is the presence of God in the world through you and me and our actions. We read in the first letter of St Peter: You are living stones..you and me are the Church entrusted with a mission. This mission is not ours or of our choosing, It belongs to Jesus and it is Jesus who commands us to preach and bear witness.
The other thing we need to be reminded of is that if we are to be the 72 and go out to our world; then we need to come back to Jesus often so we can tell him what we have done and to be renewed. Prayer is about being in the presence of the Lord every day. Prayer is allowing the rhythm of our daily prayer to open up our ears to hear God. If I never pray and try to preach the Kingdom of God, then I will only preach my kingdom and not His. Prayer is fundamental to the Christian life. With out, we dry up an wither because how can we sustain ourselves without drinking from the stream of God’s love and mercy.
So, my brothers and sisters, Jesus has picked you and me to go and tell the world about the Kingdom of Heaven. Don’t worry about what to say or bring. All we need to bring is the Jesus who sends us. We bring the Jesus we know and God will do the rest.