Called To Be Prophets
Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time (14/08/2022)
Jeremiah 38: 4-6pm.8-10;
Psalm 40: 2.3.4.18;
Hebrews 12: 1-4;
Luke 12: 49-53
By Fr Samuel Odeh
Someone once defined prophecy as the act of comforting the afflicted and of afflicting the comfortable. Preaching and living the word of God can sometimes bring tensions and divisions rather than unity and peace. This is because peace is expensive. In today's first reading some persons try to kill the prophet Jeremiah for preaching against the wealthy because of their corruption and their unfair treatment of the poor. Jeremiah was tasked with a message that was hard for the king and the people to accept and so he was persecuted, he was punished. They put him in a well with no water and he sank in the mud. But God was on his side and rescued him by the intervention of Ebedmelech, the Ethiopian. The words of the Responsorial Psalm could have been placed on the lips of Jeremiah as he was in the well: "I waited, I waited for the Lord, and he stooped down to me; he heard my cry." "He drew me from the deadly pit, from the miry clay" Anyone who becomes a true announcer of the word of God will be persecuted also.
In the Gospel reading from Luke, Jesus says to his disciples, "I came to cast fire upon the earth; and would that it were already kindled!" What fire is Jesus referring to? Near the beginning of this Gospel, in Chapter 3, John the Baptist tells the crowd that although he is baptizing with water, someone mightier, someone with more power is coming after him who will baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire. The fire Jesus speaks of is also the fire that descended on the disciples at Pentecost. It is this fire that makes them strong as they go out to the world to preach the resurrection of Jesus.
Next, Jesus tells of a baptism he is still to receive. This baptism is his suffering and death on the cross at the hand of the authorities in Jerusalem. Those who follow Jesus will also suffer and will not escape persecution. Peace is the final goal of the kingdom of God on earth but there is a price to pay for peace. Jesus tells his disciples he has come to bring division among them. A house of five would be divided three against two and two against three. They will be divided father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against her mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. We see such divisions in our time also between those who receive communion on the tongue and those who receive it on the hand, between those who go to confession regularly and those who do not go to confession regularly, between those who are wedded in church and those who are not wedded in church, between those who support abortion and those who do not support abortion. The word of God will cause these divisions among us who are disciples of Christ.
The consoling message of our second reading from The Letter to the Hebrews invites us to be strong in suffering and to do our best to overcome our difficulties: "..let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God." We are then asked to "Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted." If Jesus suffered so much hostility on account of the Gospel message, how can we expect anything less for ourselves who follow him? Those who bear witnees to Christ may even shed blood or lose their lives as in the recent terrorist attacks on Christians in Nigeria. Let our prayer this Sunday be, "Lord Jesus, teach us to announce your word to friends and enemies alike. Help us to be true to you and be faithfull to your word in spite of divisions and tensions. Amen."
