4th Sunday OT, C January 30, 2022
Fr. Albert St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette
The Word of God is always fruitful… it is living and effective. But that doesn’t mean we’re always going to like the effect it has. Jesus’ own experience is proof of that. I hinted last week that Jesus’ preaching would bear fruit and now we see it.
At first, it’s great. People are “amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth.” Jesus should be happy with that, right? He gives a good homily and even tells people that they are witnessing an ultra-important moment in all of salvation history – this passage is fulfilled in your hearing. And they even start to stir up some local pride: this is Joseph’s boy, one of us. But Jesus keeps going and “talks past the sale” so to speak. That’s when he gets into trouble.
And if you understand what he’s saying, you’ll understand why their reaction is so sudden and extreme. He anticipates what they want: do miracles for us like you did for those other people. And why not? It doesn’t cost him anything or hurt him to do all the miracles and healings he did, why not do it for his neighbors and extended family? But he flatly refuses to. Worse, he insults them.
The two examples he gives of Elijah and Elisha are significant. Besides both being miracle workers, these two have something powerful in common: they both lived during a time of great unfaithfulness. The Israelites are God’s chosen people so they should receive God’s greatest blessings. But they were breaking the commandments and ignoring the covenant in those days, so they got a curse instead. God specifically sent Elijah and Elisha to do miracles for gentiles to prove a point: you’ve rejected me so I will ignore you and do miracles for people who aren’t part of the covenant, who aren’t Israelites. Have you ever heard the name Jezebel? To this day, her name is a synonym for being an evil person. Well, Jezebel was the Israelite queen back then.
By comparing himself to Elijah and Elisha in these stories, he is comparing the whole town of Nazareth to Jezebel and the wicked Israelites from a long time ago. He’s basically saying “you don’t get miracles from me because you are as bad as the worst Israelites to ever live.” You see how that could be insulting, right? That’s why they literally try to kill him right then. But there is a time for Jesus to die and it’s not right now, so they mysteriously fail to kill him.
Why? Why insult his own people so fiercely? How is that a fruitful way to proclaim the word of God? “No prophet is accepted in his own place.” Jesus knows these people. He grew up with them. Sure, they’re ready claim him as a miracle-worker and teacher, but they are not ready to see what he really is. He is much more than Joseph’s boy with a special gift. But they can’t see past that. And to go to heaven, they need to see past that to see that he is the Son of God, the messiah, and their only hope of salvation. But seeing past it requires them to see their own faults, something no one really likes to do.
That is part of what it means for God’s word to bear fruit and be effective. This is what real love looks like. Not just being friendly or kind, not just encouraging people – though that’s definitely a form of love in many cases. Still, love “does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth.” Sometimes, the most effective thing the Word of God can do… sometimes the most loving thing a pastor can do… is convict people of their sin and hard-heartedness. Not maliciously, not to insult people on purpose, but to lovingly present a difficult truth that people are going to take as insult even when it’s not.
Which is why I sometimes wonder, have I ever made you angry? Perhaps when I say that contraception is a serious sin? Or Drunkenness? Or when I tell you that you shouldn’t receive communion if it’s been more than a year since your last confession? Or when I hint at Church teaching on worker’s rights, social justice, abortion, or gay marriage? Or when I suggest that you aren’t doing enough to live your faith and evangelize? Or when I insist on singing certain things at Mass?
Don’t get me wrong, I am not Jesus. Sometimes I am lazy or careless or stubborn or harsh. Sometimes I make people angry because what I’m saying or doing is wrong. I know that. But everything I just listed isn’t my opinion. It is the teaching of the Church. If you let your dislike for me get in the way of the truth, then are you really any different than these Nazoreans? In truth, we are all like these Nazoreans in one way or another. One of the best conversations I ever had with a priest was the one that made me the angriest.
I thought I was in love. I wanted to wax poetically about all this love I was feeling, but my spiritual director straight up interrupted me with a flat question: what is love? Go get a catechism and read it because I don’t think you know what that word means. I was furious. But I did it, and everything changed.
Do we know what love is? St. Paul’s glorious hymn to love tells us. Every one of these descriptions is a verb, an action. Love, real love is not a feeling or an experience, it is an action, a choice… a series of choices that become a habit, a virtue, a way of living. And Love. Is. Hard. The Catechism passage I was told to read said that it “remains disinterested and generous.” Disinterested means you aren’t trying to get anything out of it. I wasn’t in love, I was obsessed with getting what I thought I wanted. How often do we all do that with so many things?
What do you want? To be comfortable? To get out of Mass as quickly as possible? To be liked by your secular family, coworkers, and peers? Jesus doesn’t offer any of those things and, if I’m doing my job correctly, neither should I. If I’ve never challenged you to grow in your faith… If I’ve never convicted you of the need for ongoing conversion of heart, then I am sorry… just as sorry for the times my own sin and weakness have hurt you unfairly. Still, failing to call you to conversion is worse than hurting you by my faults because, by grace, dealing with my faults or someone else’s can help you grow spiritually, but false comfort is spiritually dangerous.
What I want for myself and for you is one thing: holiness. The Word of God is fruitful in making us holy. Sometimes that is consolation and support, sometimes that is a call to conversion that feels like an insult. I am sorry for the ways I’ve gotten it wrong. But I’m not going to stop and I’ve got more challenges coming. I pray that you hear not just me, but the Word of God and the Love of God because even though I often do, Love never fails.