Wednesday of Week 7 of Ordinary Time – Gospel
Commentary on Mark 9:38-40
There is another lesson for all of us in today’s brief passage. The disciples complain to Jesus because they saw someone casting out devils in Jesus’ name. They tried to stop him:
…because he was not following us.
Jesus tells them very clearly that they should:
…not stop him, for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. Whoever is not against us is for us.
This is a principle we need to take seriously to heart. There can be a strong temptation among us to a kind of exclusivity. Many Christian groups (both Catholic and people from other denominations) can fall into this trap. As Paul tells us in one of his letters:
…the word of God is not chained. (2 Tim 2:9)
God can do his work through all kinds of people—Christians and people of other religions and of no religion. He may even work at times through people who are ostensibly anti-religious. Far from being resentful of others doing work which we feel belongs only to Christians, we should be overjoyed. This is a clear sign of the Kingdom at work. Wherever there is love, wherever there is service, there is God.
Membership in our group is not the test. The test is whether what others do fits in with our goals of truth, love, justice, compassion, freedom, peace, non-violence and all that is good. Our God is to be found in all these things. The Church is a way to a further goal; it is not itself the end. The Church is called to be a sign of the Kingdom, but is not the totality of the Kingdom. The goal is that people with good hearts and the Church are working for the good of one another and for the realisation of the Kingdom.
Read more
Wednesday of Week 7 of Ordinary Time – First Reading
Commentary on James 4:13-17
‘Man proposes but God disposes.’ Linked with yesterday’s warnings about what can happen to us when we are driven by hedonism and greed is another about our combined arrogance, short-sightedness and presumption about the future.
The passage speaks of the great uncertainties of life, our complete dependence on God, and the necessity of submitting totally to God’s will. All of these help one know and do what is right. To disregard this is to live in pride and arrogance, and failure to do what is right is a sin.
James speaks to those who sit down to make great plans of how they are going to make a killing in business and walk off with large profits. Whole lives can be built on such dreams. But he pulls us up short:
Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring.
He reminds us of the fragility of life:
For you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.
It happens every day – young lives, full of promise, wiped out in the blink of an eye.
Concentrating our energies on a future built on the acquisition of wealth, fame and success is a total waste of time. One way or the other, it all ends in a puff of smoke, a collection of bones in a cemetery. We can seem to have everything and it can be gone in minutes. Jesus has a striking parable about that (Luke 12:13-21).
What James suggests instead of arrogant ambition is that we say:
If the Lord wishes, we will live and do this or that.
We are totally in his hands and we do not know what the next hour or the next minute will bring, let alone the next day or the next year.
The truly wise person is the one who concentrates on the here and now, who finds God in the present moment and responds to him there. Our future is built on what we do and are right now. And God is to be sought never in the past or the future, but only in the present. God’s will is to be found in the realities – not the daydreams – of our daily lives.
This is not to exclude all forms of planning in our lives. Not to plan in certain areas would be quite irresponsible. But all our planning must be in conformity with the Christian vision of life and totally contingent on developments beyond our control. We may plan for the future but, in seeking and finding God, we come back to the here and now.
Read more