Word to the Wise
Thursday, January 30, 2025 - Thursday in the 3rd Week in Ordinary Time
[Heb 10:19-25 and Mark 4:21-25]"Anyone who has ears ought to hear...Take care what you hear. The measure with which you measure will be measured out to you, and still more will be given to you. To the one who has, more will be given; from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away." [Mark]
The Gospel According to Mark has a kind of "in your face" quality about it. Jesus comes on the scene as something/someone entirely new. His teaching has a way of saying, "Hey, look me over!" He grabs us by the shoulders, shakes us, looks us in the eye and shouts, "Will you listen to me?!!!!!!" He uses parables about ordinary life situations to demonstrate what he is proclaiming! But, are we listening? Have the gospel and those parables and teachings become so familiar that we "tune them out?" Does it "cost" us anything besides the Sunday collection?
The Lutheran minister, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, martyred by the Nazis in the closing days of World War II, wrote a spiritual classic, THE COST OF DISCIPLESHIP, in which he warned about "cheap grace." The institutional expression of the Body of Christ - what we often call "the Church" - cannot substitute for our personal faith in Christ. The scriptures and preaching of the early Church Fathers are sure guides, but their sheer familiarity can lead to them becoming stagnant in us when we allow political or social behavior to command us. Christians who hold public office could do well to review Jesus' teachings in the gospels and ask how their policies measure up!! Those who hold positions of authority/leadership in "the Church" could do the same!! Jesus' challenge to the Twelve and the crowds were not just for them. They are for us, too. We cannot dismiss them with a "That was then, this is now!" attitude. Are we listening and acting accordingly? AMEN