Third Sunday in Ordinary Time - Sunday of the Word of God

24 Sunday 2021

Reading I Jon 3:1-5, 10 Responsorial Psalm Ps 25:4-5, 6-7, 8-9 Reading II 1 Cor 7:29-31 Gospel Mk 1:14-20

Brothers and Sisters,

What causes a man or woman to immediately stop what they are doing and to change how they are living?

This is the question that we are being asked by God today to reflect on and talk to him about.

We have Jonah (dove, peace) going to Nineveh (place to fish) to call them to believe in God and repent or their city will be destroyed – it is their choice.

This contrasts with the story of Sodom and Gomorrah in the Book of Genesis. These towns were so wicked that they even forced strangers to have sexual relations with them and no one was to offer protection to them against this atrocity.

Two angels come to Sodom and are met by Lot, a resident alien himself, who offers them a meal and place to sleep for the night, instead of allowing them to go to the town square. While in his house, the men of Sodom come and demand that these strangers be turned over to them, threatening the lives of Lot and all who lived in the house with him.

After the angels’ rescue Lot and turn away the men of Sodom, they tell Lot to gather his family and leave the city for God has decided to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah because of the cries of the oppressed. They also told Lot to not look back or he would face the same consequences as the cities.

Whether it was curiosity or lack of trust in her husband or the angels, Lot’s wife looked back and was turned to a pillar of stone.

My Dad tried to stop smoking many times – yet his curiosity about whether he could just smoke one cigarette afterwards, always led him back to smoking. The battle was not so much about stopping smoking cigarettes as it was more about him believing that he had overcome his weakness and could control his destiny.

I am proud of his efforts, he would try again and again, stopping for weeks and months. He never seemed to accept that it would be a battle that he could only win by not looking back and just moving forward with his life.

We can find God speaking to us in many ways and through many voices – this is one that I heard from Yoda – “When you look at the dark side, careful you must be, for the dark side looks back.”

Changing our lives is not easy, learning to trust in God and not in ourselves is hard.

Paul is speaking of this in the reading from Corinthians. In the verses before this one, we hear Paul urging the Corinthians to be less concerned with changing their states of life than with answering God’s call where it finds them.

The Corinthians are being called to decide, between continuing to live their lives for their own sake, here and now, or live their lives for the promise made by Jesus at the Last Supper and the hope delivered at the Resurrection.

There are issues too important to put off. A decision must be made.

In the days of print newspapers, there was an Ann Landers column which told about a dilemma faced by a young man:

“Dear Ann, I have got to decide between a new car or getting engaged. I really love this wonderful young lady. But every night when I go to sleep, I dream about the car.”

When we hear an invitation from Christ, we often find two conflicting inner voices within our spirit.

One is telling us, look before you leap; do not get involved; you can always do it later. Then there is a voice urging us to trust and be obedient to the call.

We cannot have it both ways. We must respond to one voice or the other.

We cannot waiver between the two options. There is no fence straddling.

Simon Peter, Andrew, James and John must make a choice – either accept the invitation or not. Having one foot in the boat that is about to sail and trying to keep the other foot on the shore is neither practical nor workable.

Jesus is about to start gathering God’s people and he needs fishers of men.

He needs followers who will accept not knowing where they will rest their heads each night or who would give them their daily bread. As we heard in Lot’s story, where you rested for the night also offered you a meal and this was often your main meal of the day. Thus, being turned away by a town meant sleeping on the ground and going hungry.

Last week, in the Gospel of John, we heard about how Andrew and James were invited to come and see and how they followed Jesus for a day, witnessing his life, with perhaps Jesus even discussing with them that he is being called to trust in God and divine providence by going into the desert and to fast for forty days while there.

Jesus is not being called to a life of ease and pleasure and neither was St. John the Baptist who they had followed. This is something Andrew and James will talk about as they return to Galilee and with their brothers.

What Jesus is offering is not the picture of what we consider the perfect life – we want to know where we are going to sleep and eat – we bask in that security – otherwise we often become anxious and fearful. Yet, our perfect life is not our choice, it is God’s choice, thus we must decide whose plan we will fulfill – God’s or ours.

These four men, Peter, Andrew, James and John, like us, are being asked to trust God and his divine providence. Ultimately, we are being asked who God is to us and just as important, who we are to God.

As we approach the altar to receive the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord Jesus, let us ask for the grace we need to place our faith and trust in him and to be the fishers and gathers of men he wants us to be.

Amen!