FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
29 JANUARY 2023
We
have been hearing from the Gospel of Saint Matthew for the last few Sundays. Jesus has established his headquarters in
Capernaum on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee. As he walks along the shore, he proclaims
that the Kingdom of Heaven has arrived in him.
He invites his listeners to repent and be part of that Kingdom. Last Sunday, he called two sets of brothers –
Andrew and Simon and James and John.
They left their fishing boats and followed him.
Today, he
takes these two sets of brothers and others who have made a commitment to
become his disciples to a mountain near the Sea. Just as Moses had given the law on a
mountain, Jesus gives his new law in the Sermon on the Mount. He begins his sermon with words that must
have comforted his disciples, who had given up everything to follow him. He tells them that they are “blessed,” a Greek
word that means “happy.” They may not
have any possessions or have any power, but they are blessed. They may not always feel the emotion of
happiness. But they are grounded in a
fortunate situation in being part of the Kingdom of Heaven already. As members of that kingdom, they will be
blessed in the future because of their intimate encounter with him as the
Messiah. When they will be persecuted,
as he will be persecuted, they will know the fullness of the Kingdom of Heaven
as their reward.
Because this
is the living Word of God, Jesus speaks it to us today. For us in our world, these beatitudes can be
both challenging and difficult. Let’s be
honest with one another. We count our
blessings when we are safe and healthy, productive and successful, financially
secure, and usually married with children.
And we rightly give thanks to God for all these blessings. But we need to hear these beatitudes from the
God who does not operate in the ways we would imagine. Throughout the Old Testament, God regularly
proclaims a preference for the poor and oppressed, along with a special care
for the widow and orphan. God did not
enter human existence as a triumphant king.
He came as a vulnerable infant born in poverty. As the disciples would eventually understand,
he will not offer salvation through an amazing visible victory. He will destroy death by entering into death
himself. God’s ways are not our ways.
It is from
this perspective that he challenges us with his beatitudes. As disciples, we are truly blessed (or happy)
when we understand that wealth and possessions will not ultimately save
us. We are happy when we mourn the
wickedness of the world, and when we get our feelings out in mourning the loss
of a loved one. We are happy when we are
meek, relying on God and not our strength to set things right. We are happy when we long for God’s saving
action in the same way we hunger for food and thirst for drink. We are happy when we offer mercy to others,
as God has offered mercy to us. We are
happy when we are peacemakers, when we make genuine efforts to bring harmony
with God and other people. Even if we
are persecuted and rejected for our faithfulness to the Son of God, we will be
happy for our reward in the fullness of the Kingdom of Heaven at the end of our
lives.
Jesus
promises us that we will experience true happiness if we embrace these
beatitudes and work to make them an integral part of our lives. Like the first disciples, we realize that the
happiness that Jesus promises is not an emotional state. It is the state of being part of the Kingdom
of Heaven in our midst. Like those
earliest disciples, we encounter him in Word and Sacrament. Like them, we trust that the Kingdom will be
fully realized at the end. Like them, we
can make a difference in our world by showing others what it looks like to be
truly blessed, truly happy people.
No comments:
Post a Comment