Sharing the World – August- 25- 2019 – Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C.

Readings: 1st Reading; Isaiah 66 : 18 – 21,       
Responsorial Psalm; Ps. 116                
2nd Reading; Hebrews 12 :5 – 7, 11 – 13,         
Gospel; Luke 13 : 22 – 30. 

The readings of today show who belongs and who does not belong to the Kingdom of God. The emphasis is that the Word of God has no boundaries. It continues to expand across the globe to all nooks and crannies. So, if you do not belong to the chosen race -Israel, know that God has also called you out of darkness into His wonderful light. Some who do not belong to the chosen race have been and will be anointed to care for God’s people. In the Gospel, Jesus cautions us about the difficulty of Christian life. True Christian life goes through the narrow gate. Some we expect to be first in the Kingdom of God, will be the last while some who are last, will be first.

Jesus says the way to happiness is through the narrow gate.This is the happiness-way of Jesus. We may think that the way to happiness is to try everything and find happiness through a variety of experiences – or to possess as much as we can, and try to find happiness through wealth, or to build up acquaintances with people of right connections and find happiness in our circle of contacts – but Jesus talks about the narrow door, and people who are last being first.

Jesus found happiness in the way He treated people, with  acceptance and real love, and with giving His life for them. That is the happiness he means: the happiness coming from commitment, between husband and wife, true friendship, those in our care; making the best of our failures, finding spaces and times for prayer when we know deep-down joy and peace of soul – this is the happiness of God, and this leads to salvation. 
 Who then will be saved? Jesus offers the door/gate to Heaven and only those who follow him will have access into the Kingdom of His father.”I am the way, the truth and the life. No man can come to the Father except through me” ( John 14:6). If you follow this way,- Jesus,  you will be saved. By following Him, we need to live  lives worthy of His followers. A life that shuns sin, not one that rejoices in sin. Not one that gives sin a mild name to enable you wallow in it. It does not matter whether you are Catholic, Baptist, Muslim, Jew, black or white, learned or untaught, priest or pastor, knight or otherwise.Jesus says the admission criterion into Heaven is not a case of Geography or ethnicity, or portfolio. All you need is to follow His commandments. I think all Christians can recite the ten commandments without second thought. Yes, but that means nothing if the commandments are not kept. Keeping the commandments is the ability to enter the narrow gate. And entering the narrow gate does not go without difficulties. To abide by the commandments, we have to fight against our seven deadly weaknesses; pride, covetousness, lust, anger, gluttony, envy and sloth. If we conquer them, we are on the safe side. We do not have to be angels to be there. Our human nature does not give us the possibility to be like the angels. Is life therefore, a trap set for us by God to punish us when we fail? In my opinion, life is not a trap set for us by God, so that He can condemn us when we fail. Life is neither a spelling bee, where no matter how many words you have gotten right, if you make one mistake, you are disqualified. Life is like a game where, even the best team loses some of its games and even the worst team has its own day of brilliance. Our goal should be to go all the year round without losing a game. If we cannot, and we win more games than we lose, and if we can do that consistently enough, with all our efforts, when the end comes, we will have won it all. We may not be perfect as this is not part of our human nature, but we must strive to be so, and He will reward our effort. While the guilt and shame that haunt us as part of sin are normal consequences of our sins, it is functional to know we are in error, rather than giving sin a different name to excuse ourselves of our wrongs. The hard truth is that you’ll never find perfection on earth. In fact you may never come close to it.Thanks to Jesus, you do not have to. In heaven, you will be as perfect as God created you to be. I understand that some of us² easily despair because we have already blown it so badly – because, you have already sinned in some really gross ways or made some really lousy decisions, you might as well not follow Jesus. You figure you have already failed. So what is the point in trying? Here is what you need to understand. No matter what you have done, or have not done, in the past, you can start walking with Jesus again. Right now! you can make choices today that will matter forever. Your decisions now may make you to be the first in the kingdom of God. If you think others have gone too far and left you behind, you are mistaken! Pick up the courage now and make amends to move forward. I understand some of your situations may need restitution. Maybe you have lied to kill, and even killed, maybe you have cheated and squandered, maybe you have been so proud, envious, lustful, ready to jump at your brother’s throat at the slightest opportunity, etc. It is quite human and functional to accept that you have been in error. Human amends for all these may make you first in the Kingdom of God and those you thought had left you far off behind will be the last.”Yes, there are those now last who will be first, and those now first who will be last”(Luke 13:30). Those you see ahead of you may only be showing you a smoke screen. I remember a story a visiting Bishop once told us in school. ‘Small Father’ (curate)looked up to ‘Big Father’ (parish priest) as the role model and could never imagine himself getting to the level of piety demonstrated by Big Father. Big Father died first. Small Father believed Big father would go straight to heaven. When Small Father died, he was directed by the angels at the gate to go to hell. In hell, he was looking for a place to hide, as he would not stand seeing himself with mere Christians he had usually scolded for being sinful. While looking for a hide-out, surprisingly, he met Big Father in hell too hiding behind a door. Astonished, Small Father asked ‘ Father you too dey here?’ Big Father placing a finger over his mouth simply made the silencing sound ‘Shhhhhh! No talk loud, Bishop di hide for that other corner’. The only way that leads to hell is through sin. In Primary school, we were taught that sin is when we do something we know is wrong. That is just what God forbids us from doing. Unfortunately we still do it even when our consciences tell us that it is bad. Sometimes, we do it to others, only to get crazy when others do it to us. The golden rule is simple ‘ do to others what you will love to be done to you’. The situation worsens when we do evil things in hiding. We hide from the human eye and ear, not from God. I stumbled on Jewish theology sometime ago and a story caught my attention. One of the sages was close to death. His students gathered around his bed, urging him to leave them with one last bit of wisdom. He said to them, “May you fear God as much as you fear men.” The students were perplexed. One of them said, “Master, has illness confused your mind? Surely you mean to say that we should fear God more than we fear people.” “No my son,” the sage replied, ” so many people do things which they know God disapproves but go great lengths to hide them from their neighbours. If only they feared God as much.” Re-examine yourself and see that what you have been hiding from mortal men is shining out to the One who gives the last judgement. You can choose the narrow gate, by simply being human, now!. Do not wait for tomorrow. Tomorrow may never come. Do not climb into your bed this night without choosing the narrow gate. The larger gate is easier but will keep you in hell for eternity. You may say that you ‘once ate and drank in the company of Jesus, and that He, Jesus, once taught in your streets’ but Jesus will reply, “I do not know where you come from. Away from me, all you wicked men!”(Luke 13:27).

A Little Prayer.

Lord Jesus, I thank you for all the times that you have lifted me when I stumbled on my way to you. Lord forgive me for all the times that I have moved away from you. Open my mind to find you in my neighbour and recognise the narrow door as I struggle to come closer to you. Amen.

Have a Blessed Week!
Bobe Talla Toh