FIFTEENTH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR - B

FIFTEENTH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR – B (Amos 7:12-15; Eph 1:3-14; Mark 6:7-13) Theme: We are called to be the prophets – Let us march forward with the mission Reflection: God speaks: through the prophets – In the Prophet of Jesus - Last Sunday we have reflected on the great and model prophet: Jesus. He is the prophet who has come in the name of the Lord. Still he is not just one of the many prophets that went before him and who also appeared in the name of the Lord. He is totally different and radically superior because it is God himself who appeared in the very person of Jesus. God directly intervenes his people. God directly talks to his people. It is no more a mere voice of God that comes from the mouth of the Lord. It is the Very Word of Him because Jesus Christ is the Word of God made flesh. God in the human form and prophet in the very human nature. - Other prophets are God’s voice through their mouth and mediation. God speaks through them. God appears to his people through the word of the prophets. With regard to Jesus it is completely different. God does not speak through Jesus like any other prophets. But He speaks IN Jesus. Jesus’ not only word, but every action is God’s. Jesus does not merely represent God but He is God himself and his very life is not his own but God’s. Thus, he becomes a prophet because he is the Word of God and he becomes a distinguished and exemplary Prophet because God speaks in him. - We are called to be prophets like him and after him: we are called to share in his prophecy. Therefore, we should not be just like any prophet of the Old Testament but we are prophets of the New Testament. The difference we have already seen: God speaks through us but it is not enough because it is like that prophecy of the OT. God has to speak IN us. Our whole life, its words and actions, are to be the testimony of the very life of God in us. This means that we have to give testimony not just by our words and actions but with the very integrity of both word and action of our life. Then only we can be good followers of the great prophet Jesus and then only God can really and concretely speak IN us, not merely through us. The readings of today highlight what it means to be a prophet with the deeper and inner meaning. Amos: acknowledging the proper identity coming from the divine call - Chosen and Sent: two important elements we have to understand in the prophet Amos are these that he is “Chosen and Sent”. Any prophecy is not of its own. Any word uttered in the biblical prophecy is not a personal word of the prophet. God first Chooses someone and secondly He Sends him into the field. o Merit of the person is not the matter: it is God who selects the person and he chooses according to his will. Therefore, in any divine call man cannot demand for anything and cannot boost on his merit or capacity. God can call even a poor and incapable in the society and can make him rich in the wisdom and powerful in the proclamation. It is absolutely God free choice. No human power can claim and question its authenticity and its efficacy. And the biblical revelation demonstrates the different prophets and their profession prior to the call. Best example is our Amos himself: he is just a shepherd man who feeds the sheep. o A mere voice for God’s word: it is God who sends “the selected”. Therefore, any prophet of the OT gives his ears and voice to what God proposes and what God disposes through them. Not even in his dream a prophet speaks what is his. He has to and he is called to speak only what God tells him to speak. Every word that comes from the mouth of the prophet is God’s very word. With the divine call the prophet is not given the guarantee of the secured life but only a mission: mission that has to face the hardness of the heart of the people. God one thing is assured: it is God who does everything through him therefore, a prophet can put whole trust in his providence. - Acknowledgement of the mission: the one who goes out as “chosen and sent”, first of all, acknowledges who he was before and who he is now. This acknowledgement is more important for the committed mission. Only the one who is aware of his previous condition and his transformed status now into the divine mediator can do justice to his call. Only then he can confront the difficult moments and problematic situations of his presence and proclamation. This is what we see in the case of Amos: He is not only aware of his call but also acknowledges it before others who question him. He says that he is a mere servant who pastures the sheep but now he is no more the mere shepherd but one who comes in the name of the Lord to proclaim his word. When he acknowledges his identity as “chosen and sent” for the mission he is no more frightened of anything and anybody. With courage and commitment he proclaims what he is commanded and indicated to speak out. - Prophecy is God’s initiative: all this “chosen and sent” and “acknowledgement of the mission” show that it is not man who begins the work of the prophecy but it originates from God’s initiation. Amos again inspires us in this aspect: he is the pastor and he would have continued it without any problems but he reveals it is God who has chosen him and has sent him to them. This removes the veil to make it clear the mystery: failing to listen to the prophet is equal to failing to listen to God himself. From the viewpoint of the prophet the mystery is clear: since he is called and sent forth he cannot but speak what God indicates. The instance and incident is seen in the prophet of Jonah. He wanted to escape from God’s call but finally finds himself in the utter helplessness and begins to speak God’s word to the people of Nineveh. - The prophet MUST speak: It is God who begins the work according to his design to bring the dispersed people to himself. Therefore, the prophet cannot reject his call. God both calls the person and strengthens him in his mission. God’s initiative cannot go undone. As the consequence, the one who receives the call speaks only what he hears and receives from the one who sends him. In a word, he cannot but speak for God. This is clear even in the New Testament. Jesus has chosen and sent the twelve disciples after his resurrection and we see the beautiful testimony of apostles in the very beginning of their mission: “Whether it is right in God’s sight to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge; for we cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:19-20). This is the courageous testimony of the coward apostle Peter and John. They reveal that God’s word cannot remain un-proclaimed. They also reveal that they cannot even hide God’s word. It has to be proclaimed. The prophets do not have their program and their proposal to proclaim but only speak out God’s will and his loving plan because they come in His Name, not in their own name. Life of the prophet: message from God and dependence on God - Message that matters: in the prophetic structure the mission is oriented on the message given by God. The quality or the capacity of the person who is sent is not very much important in this structure. His message is important because it comes from the will and initiative action of God himself. Therefore, not the person but the message he carries is to be considered. Above all, the accent is on the One who sends this prophet entrusting him a message. The one who appears with the message of God, first of all, accepts that it is not his word but the Word of the One who sent him. In this way, even prior to the proclamation of the message, he already announces with his presence and mission that it is God who speaks. Thus his message takes effect and force: God speaks to his people because he loves them, because he wants to bring man back into fellowship with him in his Kingdom. Every prophet appears with the similar message: message of God’s love. The people should not stop only with the questions: where does this prophet come from or something of his life? They cannot stop with the external observance of the person. First because it is beyond their logic because of its divine origin and second because it is not that which matters. They have to concentrate on the words he pronounces and the message he conveys. Message takes the priority because it is coming from God. - Divine providence (Gospel): today’s Gospel demonstrates the attitude of the one who is sent. He should not preoccupy himself with what he has to carry and how he has to arrange his bag. Jesus is very clear in his admonition: “He ordered them to take nothing for their journey except a staff; no bread, no bag, no money in their belts; but to wear sandals and not to put on two tunics” (Mark 6:8-9). The missionary is to be preoccupied only with the “mission entrusted” to him. Everything else is not of his concern. It is God who sends him; therefore, He will take care and provide everything for the mission. Mission of the prophet is always and completely dependent on God’s providence. Jesus also when he sends his disciples two by two for a mission, he already gives them the authority (Mark 6:7). What is needed for the mission is the authority that comes from the divine providence. The rest will be take care in the due time. Jesus tells this in the different way somewhere else: “But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well” (Mathew 6:33). “These things” here means the food, the drink and the clothing (Mathew 6:25-32). This is same with the one who is sent for the mission: he has to seek for the proclamation of the message received without being worried about his corporal existence. God provides everything: because a worker deserves the wage and the missionary deserves the sustenance. Jesus is the Great Prophet and those who follow him receive from him the mission of the prophet. Therefore, the one who is sent has to learn the same attitude of Jesus: for he says “my food is to do the will of my Father” and “Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” (Luke 2:49). Every messenger has to imbibe this missionary attitude of total dependence on the providence of God. Conclusion: We are the prophets in the world - God has chosen each one of us for a certain purpose. Each one has a particular role to play in the will of God. It is the love of his choice for us. Already with the Baptism He has kept each one of us apart. He has chosen us from among various people of the world to be the testimonies of his love. This is the conviction we should always have in mind and carry it in heart: this makes us to know our Christian identity and to live our Christian vocation. Identity reveals who we are: the followers of Christ and prophets of God’s word. Vocation reveals what we are: Sowers of the love of God both by life and by testimony. This is the effect of our mission which comes out as the fruit of our attitude and task. Two things we have to learn from Amos are these: to be conscious of the divine mission and to be dependent only on him. - Prophetic and Apostolic mission: we are called for the mission and we have to be aware of this reality. We are both “called” and “sent” to spread in the world the values of the Christ’s event. We have to speak and act in the name of God in the society and thus we have to introduce the new modality of life: life of the gospel. But this prophetic mission has to be always accompanied and attested by the personal life of credibility. Credibility means making the integrity between the word we speak and the action we do. Mind and heart have to be perfectly in harmony for the mission to be successful and effective. What we think, what we utter and what we do all should have balance. For this integrity of life and the credibility of testimony Jesus proposes two virtues: need for liberation and urgency of evangelic poverty. - Need for liberation from the desires of the world: we have to liberate ourselves from the belongingness to the material world in all the possible senses. We are attracted to the fashions of the world and we are obsessed with the passions of the earthly life. We need to get out of them. We need to renounce them. Jesus commands his disciples to leave the world behind and follow him so that they never turn back. We are also called for the same purpose. Here we have two directions to make: renouncing means first of all, leaving aside our personal desires and it means secondly, to give away what we have. This is what Jesus asks the rich man who wanted to follow him: sell out what you have and come and follow me (Luke 18:22). Everything of the world is the gift of God and it belongs to each one, not only for some powerful and authoritative hands. We need to be the first ones to free ourselves from this false and temporary possessions and thus we are more free to spend our time for the Lord and to concentrate well on the mission we are entrusted. - Evangelical poverty: it is always connected to the first one. When we liberate ourselves from the passions of the world we become poor and empty. This poverty and emptiness we chose not for ourselves, but for the Gospel and thus it is called evangelical poverty. The great model for this kind of poverty is Jesus himself: He is rich but being rich he made himself poor so that we, who are poor, can become rich and by his poverty he made us rich (2 Cor 8:9). Jesus’ poverty is manifested in every instance of his life: from the incarnation where there is no place to stay to the cross where he remained naked. Poverty also has double direction: it means first of all to forego everything for some purpose and it means secondly to be filled with the grace of God. Thus, the poverty has a positive character: it makes us to depend totally on God’s providence. Jesus has thrown himself totally on the will of His Father. Whole of his earthly mission he remained poor and dependent on His Father and at last he commends his whole life (his breath and spirit) to him on the cross. This evangelical poverty of Jesus manifested on the cross makes him enter into the richness of life and glory: God lifted him up above all as the king of the universe (Phil 2:11). This will be our reward too if we practice this poverty for the gospel of love to the humanity. - Therefore, we have to be conscious of our mission of “being prophets” in the world: prophets called and sent in the name of the Lord. By our word and life we need to proclaim God’s love to the world. In our journey God is with us because it is He who starts and sustains the prophetic mission in us. Thus, with the awareness of beings the prophets, let us march forward with the mission.