3rd. Sunday of the Year (A)
(Isaiah 8:23-9:3; 1st. Corinthians 1:10-13, 17; Matthew 4:12-23.)
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When Jesus heard that John had been arrested He withdrew to
Galilee, (and then) leaving Nazareth He went to live in Capernaum by the
sea. From that time on Jesus began to preach and say, ‘Repent, for the
Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.’
Jesus -- anointed by the
Holy Spirit and proclaimed by the voice of His heavenly Father after His
baptism by John the Baptist in the river Jordan -- had left Judea on hearing of
John’s subsequent imprisonment and returned home; not to His home at Nazareth, but rather to Capernaum,
though not without His mother’s ‘blessing’, given at the wedding feast at
Cana. ‘Blessing’? you might be
thinking; yes, blessing, because she most humbly yet persistently urged Him to
do that first of His miracles which His Father in heaven intended to set the
tone for all Jesus’ subsequent works and words, meant to bring ultimate joy
and fulfilment for all those willing to believe in His Gospel and live
humbly, loving their fellows and in obedience to God’s law.
Jesus was in Capernaum,
with some disciples who had come with Him from Judea … He was obviously
thinking about the divine mission now taken from John’s shoulders and committed
to His own burning zeal for the glory of His heavenly Father’s name and the
salvation of all men and women willing to ‘repent’ on learning of the Father’s
glory and goodness.
As He was walking by the sea of Galilee He saw two brothers, Simon
who is called Peter and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea; they
were fishermen. He said to them, ‘Come after Me and I will make you
fishers of men.’
‘Come after Me’ … leave
your home and family, and follow Me!! Come!
Not on some common project as equals, but as My disciples, and I will
make something of you.’
Jesus, walking by the Sea
of Galilee and looking at those He saw and, by the grace of the Spirit given
Him, knowing and deciding who to choose and call to Himself!
There is no one on earth
doing that today, dear People of God!
Nevertheless, the Spirit of Jesus IS still here on earth in
the Body of Christ which is the Church; at work, choosing and inviting, still calling those to whom the Father sends Him whispering in their hearts and
minds, ‘Believe in Jesus, and let His Word and Sacraments make something of
you! I will most certainly help you do
what you cannot do of yourself … become a child of God and heir to eternal life
in heaven.
How
very intriguing those few words ‘Come follow Me’ must have been for the two brothers!
This was not the very first time they had encountered Jesus; they had learned
of Him from John the Baptist (JB to Andrew to Peter), and at the recent
Passover festival in Jerusalem they had witnessed, or at least heard
eye-witness reports of, His remarkable activity and confrontations with Temple
authorities. And then, as I have already
mentioned, the subsequent marvellous
happenings at the marriage feast in Cana on the way back to Galilee. In
other words, Peter and Andrew already knew quite a bit about
Jesus.
Today
however, things were different somehow, very different.
Jesus was obviously starting something totally new --- His divinely-commissioned
Public Ministry --- and for that He was intent on Personally choosing disciples
to follow Him now, and accompany Him throughout His missionary journeys. Such intimacy and proximity was essential,
that thus they might learn at first hand His ways and His purposes, so that,
ultimately, they might be able not only to continue His work in Israel but even
extend it world-wide.
Come after Me,
and I will make you fishers of men!
What
an ideal, perfect, call for men for men such as Simon and Andrew: few words
indeed, but full of meaning, promise, and challenge! At once, they
left their nets and living and followed Him!
See,
there, People of God, how imperious a vocation to follow Jesus can be,
and is, essentially!!
Going
further He saw James and John in a boat with their father Zebedee,
He called them,
and
though we do not know what specific words of invitation Jesus used, the fact is
that His words lit up a firebrand in their hearts which remained with them
throughout their lives with Him and for Him, earning them the appropriate
nickname of ‘sons of thunder’:
And immediately they left their boat and their father and
followed Him.
Now,
People of God, can we, dare we, say that Jesus wants all of us -- who like to
think of ourselves as disciples of Jesus
-- to have something of that original spirit of absolute, unquestioning commitment
manifested by those first, specially chosen, Apostles, in our relationship with
Him? Surely, I think you will agree. Let us therefore look at what that means.
With
these first-choice disciples Jesus went immediately upon an introductory
mission throughout all Galilee, acquainting them with His ways and
teaching them His purposes:
Teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the Gospel of the
Kingdom (‘Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand’), and curing every disease
and illness among the people.
He
wanted these chosen disciples to come to know Him Personally. ‘Come
after Me’, ‘Come follow Me’, ‘Come and see’, had been the words He used. The two pairs of brothers certainly saw much
that was interesting, remarkable, and inspiring as they accompanied Him around
Galilee: devils were not allowed to disclose Him, human titles and dignities He
rejected, and the people’s earthly expectations He made no attempt to
satisfy. Obedience and self-commitment were all that Jesus required
of them at first. However, a humble
awareness of and responsiveness to His Holy Spirit -- inclining and gradually
inspiring them to sincere acknowledgement of Jesus’ extraordinary dignity and
to an ever-deeper love for His Person -- was that to which He aspired
for them.
Their
daily work on His mission was to help Him by finding food and lodging,
preparing food, protecting Him from over-enthusiastic crowds, warding off
troublesome individuals, answering simple questions of the people, and perhaps
reporting to Him concerning the people’s mood and/or expectations, the variety
of needs in their society, and inevitably, helping individuals taken ill,
children lost etc., etc. All very helpful for Jesus but not what
Jesus had really chosen them for in the first place; not what He ultimately
intended for them.
Their
supreme work was to be that of themselves imbibing of His very Spirit to
the utmost of their being, to the utmost of God’s gift to them, by observing
not only His teaching and guidance, but His every gesture and even the tenor of
His general bearing and facial emotions; and most importantly, by always
trying to get better at waiting before forming any personal opinions
about what He would do, should do or had done, or about possible reasons for
His behaviour.
Dear
People of God, that picture of the originally chosen Apostles setting out to
follow Jesus on His inaugural public mission is a remarkable and truly
inspiring model for all of us wanting and longing to give authentic witness to
Jesus and help in His work today. For that end, there is nothing better
than a deep commitment to and understanding of our Catholic faith; plus a
measure of spiritual sensitivity that can be determined only by the sincerity
and depth of our personal humility and the infinitely wise and generous measure
of God’s Gift -- His Spirit -- in our lives. Faith in Jesus
directly, mediated to us through His Church indeed, but not by her
substituting for, or taking the place of, Jesus Himself; spiritual sensitivity,
that is, awareness of and responsiveness to, the guidance and inspiration of
His most holy Spirit working through His Church, in our
lives.
True,
we do not have Jesus walking before and alongside of us; but we do most
certainly have His presence with us in Holy Mother Church, in her Scriptures,
especially the Gospels and New Testament Epistles, in her Sacraments, above all we have His physical Presence in her Eucharist; yet more intimately, we do have the
presence of His Most Holy Spirit ‘gifted’ to Mother Church that He might
all the better come to us and form us who are willing, into
ever-truer likenesses of Jesus for the glory of His Father and the well-being and salvation of all our
brothers and sisters in Christ.
My
dear People, let us now, at the end of these short considerations recall,
understand more fully, and whole-heartedly delight in, these words from the inspiring psalm we heard earlier:
The Lord is my light, my light and my salvation, whom should I
fear? One thing I ask of the Lord; this I seek: to dwell in the house of
the Lord (and) gaze upon the beauty of the Lord all the days of my life. I
believe I shall see the bounty of the Lord in the land of the living!
Wait for the Lord with courage; be stout-hearted, and wait for the Lord.
