Partnership for the Gospel

October 31: Friday of Week 30 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Philippians 1:1-11; Psalm 111:1-2, 3-4, 5-6; Luke 14:1-6

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings. 

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship?

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life ... Step Five )

Partnership for the Gospel

“Partners with me in grace” (Philippians 1:7).

Paul has a novel way of looking at religion. For him, being Christian is a “partnership (koinonia) for the Gospel,” being “co-partners (syn-koinonous) in grace.” Do we think of it this way?

People form partnerships to work together. With shared responsibility and shared authority. The key word is “work.”

Paul calls us “co-partners in grace” to specify that the key to our shared work is our shared life. By “grace” we share in the divine life of Christ together in order to do the divine work of Christ together. If we think of them both together, we will “give thanks to the Lord with all our heart” (Responsorial).  “How great are the [divine-human] works of the Lord!”

In the Gospel, Jesus says our responsibility for others takes precedence over the most  sacred symbol of Jewish belonging, the Sabbath observance: “Who among you, if your son or ox falls into a cistern, would not immediately pull him out on the Sabbath day?” Wouldn’t it be a “sin” not to?

This teaches us that our worst sins may be our failures to take responsibility. If Eucharist is the “source and summit of the Christian life,” and Christian life is a “partnership in grace” to “live and give” the Good News, then our Sabbath observance should renew our commitment to exercise responsibility for everything, everywhere.

  

PRACTICE & PRAY ALL DAY:

“Lord, work with me, work in me, work through me.”

Call To Arms

October 30: Thursday of Week 30 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Ephesians 6:10-20; Psalm 144:1, 2, 9-10; Luke 13:31-35

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings. 

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship? 

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life... Step Five).

Call To Arms

“Blessed be the Lord, my rock” (Psalm 144:1).

Christianity is a fight; not just against the ignorance, fear, ingrained attitudes and values of people, but—we need to know this—against “the tactics of the Devil.” We are opposed by “the evil spirits in the heavens.”

 So we need to “draw our strength from the Lord and from his mighty power.” We ourselves don’t have what it takes. So, to protect ourselves, we “put on the armor of God.” We call up our divine knowledge of the “truth”; God-given confidence in our basic “righteousness”; undiscouraged “readiness to proclaim the Good News.” We use the touchstone of “faith,” against which all errors shatter; and take cover under assurance of sharing in God’s divine life, which is “salvation.” We go on the offensive with the “sword of the Spirit,” cutting through the enemy’s lies with “the word of God.”

As “stewards of the manifold grace of God,” we manage all this weaponry. We know how. If not, we take responsibility for learning through reading, instruction and spiritual direction.

Blessed be the Lord, my rock, who trains my hands for battle, my fingers for war.

My refuge and my fortress, my stronghold, my deliverer,

My shield, in whom I trust.

Stewardship demands perseverance. Perseverance depends on stewardship—effectively managing the resources available to us. Faith helps us identify them; hope empowers us to use them. Love gives motivation.

PRAY, when tempted: “Come, Holy Spirit!”

PRACTICE: Be on guard but unafraid.

Rights Follow Obligations

October 29: Wednesday of Week 30 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Ephesians 6:1-9; Psalm 145:10-11, 12-13, 13-14; Luke 13:22-30

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings.  

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship? 

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life... Step Five).

Rights Follow Obligations

 “Let all your works give you thanks, O Lord” (Psalm 145:10).

Every right comes from an obligation. Parents’ right to command comes from their obligation to govern their children. Humans have the right to life and freedom because they are obliged to live and act in a way that lets them know, love and serve God. And all those who share in Christ’s kingship by Baptism have the right to work for change in the Church and world because all are responsible for establishing God’s reign. Some particular relationships determine specific rights and duties.

A fundamental obligation, shared by all, is the duty to give God thanks and praise. This gives us the right to worship anywhere and in any way that does not make it harder for others to fulfill their obligations. Distracting noise in public ignores the right—and obligation—others have to choose what they focus on. Private devotions—like saying grace in public—don’t, though “secularists” oppose them.

Non-religious, non-patriotic or anti-social people have no obligation to silence well-wishers who in good faith say “Merry Christmas,” “Happy Fourth of July,” or “Have a good day.” So they have no right to ban such expressions indiscriminately. It is not against freedom of conscience to allow others freedom of speech unless what they say causes damage—as public profanity does.

Responsible stewards should think out rights and obligations.

PRAY: “Lord, keep me faithful in all my words.”

PRACTICE: Claim your rights; respect those of others.

We Will Be Perfect

October 28: Tuesday of Week 30 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Ephesians 5:21-33; Psalm 128:1-2, 3, 4-5; Luke 13:18-21

Saints Simon and Jude, Apostles

Ephesians 2:19-22; Psalm 19:2-3, 4-5; Luke 6:12-16

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship? 

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life... Step Five).

We Will Be Perfect

“Their message goes out through all the earth” (Psalm 19:4).

The Christian message is that “in Christ” humans are destined to be absolutely perfect.

All of us in the Church are “built upon the [divine-human] foundation of the Apostles,” men both holy and sinful, as we are (Ephesians 2:20). But we are “being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.” John saw us as “the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband” (Revelation 20:2).

The Church is the “bride of Christ.” Jesus is making her “holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the [transforming influence of his] word.” When he comes in triumph to celebrate the “wedding banquet of the Lamb,” he will “present the Church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind—yes… holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:27).

But Jesus began by choosing twelve Apostles, a group small like a “mustard seed” or bit of yeast in a large pot of dough. Small but active, like seeds and yeast.

Christian stewardship is by definition active. The master finds the “wise steward” at “work when he arrives” (Luke 12:43). Our first work is to grow in faith, hope and love, knowing perfection is our goal and our promised destiny.

PRAY: “Lord, give me ‘life to the full.’”

PRACTICE: Work to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Authentic Christianity

October 27: Monday of Week 30 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Ephesians 4:32-5:8; Psalm 1:1-2, 3, 4, 6; Luke 13:10-17

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings.

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship? 

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life... Step Five).

Authentic Christianity

“Live as children of light” (Ephesians 5:8).

Paul focused so much on the true mystery of Christian living—which is not “good works” of “our own doing,” (Ephesians 2:8; 3:17), but the gift, “grace,” of incorporation into Christ—that he had to remind us it also excludes “ordinary” immorality: “impurity, greed, obscenity, silly or suggestive talk!”

“Greed” is the one we overlook, especially in its culturally acceptable forms.

But Paul’s focus is on “being Christ,” living as God, as his “beloved children: kind, compassionate, forgiving as God forgives, living in love.” Before, we were children of the culture, “darkness.” But now we are “light in the Lord,” to “live as children of light.”

We are “stewards” of this mystery, charged to keep returning everyone’s focus to living on the level of God, to “going on toward perfection, leaving behind the basic teaching about… repentance from dead works” (Hebrews 6:1), striving “to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that we may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:19).

Francis says (Joy of the Gospel 36, 164), our “first proclamation must ring out over and over: ‘Jesus Christ… is living at your side every day to enlighten, strengthen and free you.’” Being Christian is constant growth through constant interaction with Jesus. “The foundation of the New Law is in the grace of the Holy Spirit, manifested in faith which works through love.”

PRAY: “Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief.”

PRACTICE: Look higher.

Saving Grace

October 26: Thirtieth Sunday of Ordinary Time:

Exodus 22:20-26; Psalm 18:2-3, 3-4, 47, 51; 1Thessalonians 1:5-10; Matthew 22:34-40

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings.

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship? 

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life... Step Five).

Saving Grace

“O Lord, my rock, my fortress, my deliverer” (Psalm 18:2).

Jesus saves us many ways. One is by his commandment of love.

How many evils, how much suffering has been averted by the commandment, “Love your neighbor as yourself”? If we only knew, how fervently would we exclaim, “O Lord, my rock, my fortress, my deliverer!”

This commandment goes beyond the “shalt not” prohibitions against killing, stealing, lying and destroying marriages. If everyone just observed those, the world would be a paradise. But “Love your neighbor as yourself” is an open-ended directive to help one another in every way we can. That is a “commandment beyond all commandments.”

Since God first taught it, even though we have obeyed it so imperfectly, the effect it has had on human life is immeasurable.

And Jesus changed it. He replaced it with his “new commandment”: to ‘love one another just as I have loved you” (John 13:34). That is a commandment beyond the scope of human nature itself. The commandment to be divine; to love on the level of God.

That is the assignment to stewardship.  Every baptized Christian is consecrated and committed to be a “faithful and wise steward, whom the master set over his household” to help all in need and to address the causes that make them needy (Luke 12:42). As “stewards of his kinship,” we have the mission of managing his business—which is love.

  

PRACTICE and PRAY all day: Lord, love with me, in me, through me.

Repent Of What?

October 25: Saturday of Week 29 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Ephesians 4:7-16; Psalm 122:1-2, 3-4, 4-5; Luke 13:1-9

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings. 

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship? 

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life... Step Five).

Repent Of What?

“…That he might fill all things” (Ephesians 4:10).

To “fill all things,” Jesus must be in all the persons united to him in his body, the Church. This, in three words is the message Paul was sent to preach: “the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27).

As Christians, we should be more conscious of this than of anything else: Christ in us to “equip” us as “holy ones” for the work of “building up the Body of Christ.” This, not keeping commandments and “going to church,” is what being Christian is all about. It is all about growing and helping others to grow in “faith and knowledge” until Christ is brought to “full stature” in us his body.  The Church is meant to be, and be visibly,  “the fullness of him who fills all in all” (Ephesians 1:22).

That is what we will be judged on.

Those who do not know this have not been authentically evangelized. Those not being kept aware of it through teaching, preaching and Eucharist are in sub-standard parishes. Those not working to make it happen are “unfaithful stewards” of the grace entrusted to them.

Those who resent this, preferring to focus on other people’s homosexuality, irregular marriages or abortions, should hear Jesus saying, “Do you think they are more guilty than everyone else? If you do not repent, you will perish.”

PRAY: “Jesus, make me authentic.”

 PRACTICE: Put first things first.

Spiritual Leadership

October 24: Friday of Week 29 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Ephesians 4:1-6; Psalm 24:1-2, 3-4, 5-6; Luke 12:54-59

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings.

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship? 

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life... Step Five).

Spiritual Leadership

“The people that longs to see your face” (Responsorial).

Jesus asks, ““Why do you not judge for yourselves what is right?” Saint Paul was shocked that Christians would sue each other: “Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to decide between one believer and another, but a believer goes to court against a believer—and before unbelievers at that?” (1Corinthians 6:5).

“In fact,” he said, “to have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather be wronged? Or defrauded?” He is echoing Jesus: “If anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well: (Matthew 5:40). Paul is simply “urging us to live in a manner worthy of the call we have received.”

If these radical teachings are forgotten, or ignored, the laity are as much at fault as the clergy. We are all “stewards of the multi-faceted grace of God” (1Peter 4:10). We are all charged to “learn, live and give” the Good News as disciples and prophets; to know and make known the word of God, “bringing out of our storeroom what is new and what is old” (Matthew 13:52), like “the faithful and wise steward, whom the master set over his household, to give them their portion of food at the proper time” (Luke 12:42).

All are equally responsible for preserving our Christian identity.

PRAY: “Lord, make us people who long to see your face!”

PRACTICE: Examine your priorities.

Reconciliation

October 23: Thursday of Week 29 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Ephesians 3:14-21; Psalm 33:1-2, 4-5, 11-12, 18-19; Luke 12:49-5

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings.  

What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship? 

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life... Step Five)

Reconciliation

“I have come to set the earth on fire.” (Luke 12:49).

Jesus came to “establish peace on the earth,” but he knew it would start with “division.”

Saint John Paul II said, “The consequences of sin are the reasons for division—within each person, and within the social environment. The tragedy of humanity today consists precisely in its similarity to the experience of Babel,” whose builders, “intent on building a symbol of unity, found themselves scattered, divided in speech, incapable of consensus and agreement. They had attended only to the horizontal dimension of work and social life, forgetting the vertical dimension by which they would have been rooted in God” (after Synod on Reconciliation, 12/2/84).

Pope Francis said the Holy Spirit himself causes division, “almost as if he were an Apostle of Babel,” by “giving different charisms and inspiring prophetic innovations.

“But it is also the Holy Spirit who creates unity from these differences,” not in uniformity, “but in harmony” (Tornielli, Francis… 2013).

As “stewards of the fire” Christ started, we are “strengthened with power through his Spirit,” and work “that Christ may dwell in all hearts through faith,” so all will “know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, and be filled with all the fullness of God.”

We do this “by the power at work within us” from him “who is able to accomplish far more than all we ask or imagine.”

PRAY: “Come Holy Spirit, enkindle in us the fire of your love.”

PRACTICE: Reconcile differences.