Reflection for the 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2023

“’What if I wish to give this last one the same as you? Or am I not free to do as I wish with my own money? Are you envious because I am generous?’”

Welcome as we continue our journey of study and commit ourselves to the work of following, witnessing to, and sharing Jesus.

Last Sunday we talked about celebration, and the many reasons we, who follow, witness to, and share Jesus have for celebrating.

We learned last week of the amazing generosity of God’s forgiveness. After Peter’s question related to accounting for forgiveness Jesus replies that forgiveness for those who follow Him is not a thing to be counted. Rather, our forgiveness must remain uncountable. We are not in Jesus’ gospel life as scorekeepers. The limitless forgiveness of our good and loving God is to be the forgiveness we are known by. 

Our reconciliation and salvation, our redemption all come from the uncountable gift of God’s only Son, and His self-giving to save us.

Imitating God’s uncountable forgiveness we can look at ourselves and each other differently, as freed people.

This Sunday we are once again reminded of God’s generosity.

Jesus’ well-known parable of the landowner and the workers covers several points again related to counting, and there is more to it than what is at face value.

The first workers are looking at the generosity of the landowner and admire it. Wow, this guy is so generous I can’t wait to see what I get. After all, these latecomers are not as good and deserving as I am. They lazed around all day, they’re bums. I’m a hard worker. They felt them less worthy than themselves (counting and judgment). When they get the same, they grumbled.

The early workers are grumbling not just because of the wage, but because of the generous redemption practiced by the landowner. All work was redeemed without counting the score or the before.

St. Paul reminds us to conduct [our]selves in a way worthy of the gospel of Christ. That, brothers and sisters, means that we must refrain from counting what others have or have not done, from looking at someone’s past, and from judgmentalism.

Some figure they are at the front of the line for God’s blessing based on history alone. Jesus tells us it is not so. Our generosity modeled on the Father’s in the now (the last thing) is what matters.

Reflection for Palm Sunday 2022

It is you who have stood by me in my trials; and I confer a kingdom on you, just as my Father has conferred one on me, that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom.

Throughout Lent we talked about what Jesus came to fulfill. Today we enter the week of ultimate fulfillment that took away our bruises and reignited us.

We start the week of fulfillment at the moment Jesus enters Jerusalem in triumph, to the acclamation of Israel. Then, at the very end of our Liturgy of the Palms we are starkly presented with the Scourging of the Crucifix. 

On this first day of the week, we move from triumph to the torture leading to the Cross. Yet even in the Scourging of the Crucifix we hear the promise: “It is written, they strike the Shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered. But, after I am resurrected, I will go before you to Galilee.” He will indeed rise and be with us. He is not abandoning us. He is saving us, not just for a week, but forever.

Let us look at Jesus’ weeklong journey and its parallels to our journey as citizens of the Kingdom.

We, the people of Christ Jesus, now reside in the Kingdom Jesus came to establish, that He has conferred on us – no, not just on the Apostles, not just on those who were there back then – but on all of us who live now in eternity with Him along with all who came before and will come after us.

Because of this week we have come out of a world mired in tortuous death, a world blind and deaf, and have entered the Kingdom life. We dwell in the Kingdom of everlasting life, a place of seeing and hearing where Jesus’ gospel path defines our steps.

Because of this week we have been pulled free from the imprisonment of fear and want. We are no longer jailed by the type of fear the Jewish leadership fell into – The Romans will come and destroy... No one can take away what we have! No one can remove Christ’s promises from us. Satan still tries to accuse us, but we are able to say confidently – away from me, I am washed in the blood of Jesus and have been set free. I have the promises of Jesus, so I have no want, the chains of my captivity have been broken. I have absolute fearless assurance.

Because of this week we have an eternal ‘year of favor, a year acceptable to the Lord.’ The “year acceptable to the Lord” that Jesus spoke about that day in Nazareth, which He brought about this week, was a reference to a Jewish Jubilee Year. The Jubilee Year was one in which all debts were remitted, all lands restored to their original owners, and the liberation of all slaves. In the Jubilee Year the people were invited to see the world through God’s eyes. We live in that eternal year now, where the debt of sin has been paid and where we hold God’s vision of us – as beautiful forever by Jesus’ redemption. It is all about this week!