Homily: 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle B
My
Grandma Lucy (my mother’s mother) was a tough lady. She grew up in a time known in the United
States as “The Great Depression”. Her
family struggled to live with very little when she was growing up and so she
had to work as part of her family’s survival of that difficult time. She never stopped this hard work. She always kept a vegetable garden, which
meant tilling the ground and weeding.
She cooked most everything from scratch, including kneading dough with
her hands (we always said that Grandma Lucy had “man hands” and this is why!). She was a tough lady.
As
her grandchildren, we knew that she loved us and she definitely showed her love
in tender ways. But Grandma was also a “no-nonsense”
kind of lady and she had a way of letting us know that we were getting too
rambunctious. Whenever we were getting
too noisy, she would say “HEY!”… just like that… “HEY!”…”you kids stop making
all that noise!” and all of us would immediately stop what we were doing and
start to play a little more calmly. It’s
been 29 years since Grandma Lucy passed and I can still hear that “HEY!” as
clear as if she was saying it here today.
Like I said, she was a tough lady.
We
probably all have (or have had) somebody in our life like Grandma Lucy. Someone who commanded such authority that
only a word from them would cause us to stop what we were doing and change our
behavior. Hopefully, these were people
that we loved and whom we obeyed out of respect for their authority (and,
perhaps, their capacity to put “the fear of God” into us!). It seems to be part of human nature to
recognize and respond to an authoritative word whenever we hear it. ///
In
our first reading today, we heard Moses telling the Israelite people that God
would send them another prophet, like him, who would speak God’s authoritative
word to them. After wandering 40 years
in the desert, the Israelite people were about to enter into the land God had
promised to give them. Moses would not
enter the land with them; and so God promised to raise up another prophet from
among them to speak his authoritative word to them after they entered the
land. In telling them this, Moses warned
them: “Whoever will not listen to my words which he [the prophet] speaks in my
name, I myself [God] will make him answer for it.” In other words, Moses was telling them that the
word from God that the prophet will speak would have authoritative power.
In
the Gospel reading, we see the fulfillment of this promise. Jesus, who was beginning his public ministry,
entered the synagogue in Capernaum and taught the people. The reading says that “the people were
astonished at this teaching, for he taught them as one having authority and not
as the scribes.” This is important to
note because of what came before in our first reading. Remember what Moses told the Israelites: “But
if a prophet presumes to speak in my name an oracle that I have not commanded
him to speak… he shall die.” Thus, when
the scribes and Pharisees taught, they almost never claimed their own
authority. Rather, they always referred
to a teacher or a prophet from the past who was known to have taught truly.
Jesus,
however, didn’t do that. He taught using
his own authority. How often in Matthew’s
Gospel do we hear Jesus say, “You have heard it said… but I say to you…” Jesus claimed authority to generate his own
teaching and the people were so unaccustomed to it that they were “astonished”.
Then
Jesus took it to the next level. The man
with the unclean spirit presents himself and the spirit speaks out. Jesus, with only a word, silences the spirit
and drives the spirit out of the man.
Grandma Lucy’s “HEY!” was strong, but I don’t think it was ever that
strong! The authority of Jesus’ word
could direct evil spirits. It’s no
wonder that the people were “amazed” and asked themselves, “What is this?” It was the fulfillment of what God had
promised through Moses. At the time,
however, they didn’t fully understand it. ///
This
reading comes to us today and begs the question of us: “Do I believe in, and
submit to, the authoritative word of Jesus in my life?” In other words, do I allow the words of Jesus
to stop me in what I am doing and to change my behavior? This is an important question because, unlike
the unclean spirit, who cannot deny the truth that he sees clearly before him—that
Jesus is “the Holy One of God”—we have the capacity to deny the truth and
authority that is before us. While this
doesn’t diminish the power of the authoritative word of Jesus, it does nullify
its power in us. Without this, we are
left to navigate the world with only our own, limited power. With it, however, we find the correction,
direction, and the power to overcome the challenges of our lives.
Friends,
as Christian disciples, this is the “secret sauce” for fulfilled living! By believing in and submitting to the
authoritative word of Jesus in our lives, we unlock the interpretative tool
that helps us navigate through our lives by helping us to make sense of the
inevitable sufferings we endure and to enlighten our minds and our hearts to
the truth about our lives and our purpose as children of God, destined for
eternal life.
We
find this word in the Gospels, of course, but throughout the Bible, too. The Psalms are a great source for
encountering the authoritative word of God.
So too the “wisdom” books (Wisdom, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, etc.) and the
apostolic letters in the New Testament.
Reading and meditating on these or any of the books of the Bible inform
our minds and hearts so that we can hear God speaking his authoritative word to
us in the particular circumstances of our lives. Thus, as a follow-up to our celebration of
the Word of God last Sunday, I want to continue to urge you to make the study
of the Bible an important part of your daily lives. ///
As
you do, let us never forget that Jesus, the Word of God, is truly present among
us: particularly when we celebrate the Mass.
And so, as we worship him with our praise of thanksgiving here in this
Mass, let us be joyful for his presence among us, so that we might confidently
give witness to him and his saving power in our daily lives.
Given in Spanish at St. Joseph Parish: Rochester, IN –
January 28th, 2024
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