FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
A prophet is rejected. This Jeremiah experienced (first reading). And this was the first Christ learned when he preached in the synagogue in Nazareth (gospel). But because of his call (first reading) a prophet can endure it. And the irony is that he (Christ) is rejected because of his broadmindedness, his universality, preaching salvation to all people (gospel). As usual, the second reading brings a theme of its own: Paul speaks about the greatness of charity (love).
It would have been better if the first reading would include also verses six till ten. Verses eleven till sixteen (double vision) are justly omitted since they interrupted the clear line of the call.
As with Isaiah and Ezekiel so also with Jeremiah (and lastly any prophet) the call makes the prophet what he is. The prophet (1) is called, (2) “consecrated” and (3) sent, commissioned to preach. By nature Jeremiah was not eager to preach, being rather shy and withdrawn and even melancholic. And since a prophet has to tell the truth, if people like it or not, it was even the harder for Jeremiah. He lived in a very difficult time (628-586 B.C.) before the destruction of Jerusalem and the exile of Babylon. People became more and more unfaithful to God’s word. The prophet had to warn against wrong alliances and advocate submission to the superpower Babylonia in order to avert the worse. This earned him the reproach of treason. In reality he remained faithful to the Jewish cause. God's cause, remained amidst the ruins of Jerusalem, but was later forced to go into exile in Egypt and there was murdered by his own countrymen, according to an old tradition
But God’s call strengthens him. Jeremiah shall not be afraid of opposition and own timidity, but rather preach what God tells him (1:7-8). God’s word has power (1:9-10). And thus the prophet will become a pillar of iron, a wall of brass (1:17), even if all are against him. He shall not be prophet for Israel alone but for all nations (1:5).
Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 12:311-13:13
The Corinthian community was a charismatic community.
Many were looking for the different charism Paul tells his Corinthians that
charisms are good and useful if they are used for the well being of the
community and not for his own gratification, and if there is order and
discipline (1 Cor 12:1-11). The most important charism is not speaking
in tongues as many apparently think, but prophecy. The different members
endowed with charisms form the one Body of Christ (1 Cor 12:12-31). But Paul
shows even a better way than charisms: Love stands high above all gifts of the
Spirit. And so in 1 Cor 12:31-13:13 Paul unfolds the encomium on love.
It would look as if this agape = love is a human virtue without reference to
Christology. Thus there is no clarification about its object. It is not clearly
said if it means God's love for man or man's love for God or his fellowmen. It
is valid for both. And so the description is akin to Wisdom Literature and some
think that this encomium(= song
of praise) is pre-Pauline, which the apostle made his own and elaborated
on:
(1) He who has no love has nothing. (13:1-3), even if he should know all secrets, would have great faith and even die a martyr (if that were possible).
(2) He who has love has everything (13:4-7).
The qualities of love are:
v.4 1. patient
2. kind
3. not jealous
4. not put on airs
5. not snobbish
v.5 6. not rude
7. not self-seeking
8. not prone to anger
9. not brood over injuries
v.6 10.not rejoice in what is wrong
11.rejoices with the truth
v.7 12.no limit to forbearance
13.no limit to its trust
14.hopes every thing
15.no limit to its power to endure
(3) He who has love has eternal life (13:8-12)
Prophecies, tongues, knowledge cease. Our present knowledge and faith are in comparison to the future knowledge like a child and a mature man or like a picture we see in a mirror. In heaven we will see face-to-face, made possible by love.
(4) Coda (13:13) Love remains forever.
Three things remain on earth: Faith, hope and love. Faith gives way to vision (2 Cor 5:7), hope to possession (Rom 8:24), but love remains forever.
Today’s gospel brings the reaction of people to Jesus' first preaching in the synagogue of Nazareth. The last sentence (Lk 4:21) is repeated: “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing," with Christ’s reading the text of Is 61:1-2 Is fulfilled: Christ, full of the Holy Spirit starts preaching the good news to the poor.
The reaction seems to be first favorable but soon turns into the opposite. They finally reject him because
(1) he cannot be more than they are. But they are simple people from Nazareth. How could he be more! They know (that's at least what they think) him to well, him and his folks. It is a common experience that no prophet is appreciated in his own hometown;
(2) he should have started preaching in Nazareth and not in Capernaum;
(3) he should have performed miracles in their midst, not just somewhere else;
(4) he omitted the part “to announce a day of vindication by our God” (Is 61: 2b).
The result is: People of Nazareth want to get rid of Jesus and kill him, throwing him from the hill on which the city is built. The evangelist does not ask, how that was possible since it would have taken a walk for more than two kilometers to reach that peak outside of Nazareth.
We saw already last Sunday that this event probably did not take any place at the beginning of Jesus’ activity but belongs to Luke's theology. He wants to show, as he does in his second work the Acts, that the gospel was preached to the nations when and because his own people rejected him.
HOMILY
JESUS THE MERCIFUL AND UNIVERSAL PROPHET (SAVIOR)
One intention of the gospel of St. Luke is to show Jesus as the merciful and the universal savior. It is true, the Jews according to God's design are and shall be the chosen people, as especially St. Paul outlines in Rom 9-11. And so even Jesus himself limited his activity to the Jews and went only by way of exception to the pagans. Thus he says: "My mission is only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" (Mt 15:24). The healing of the pagan centurion's servant (Lk 7:1-10 par) and of the daughter of the Syrophoenician woman (Mk 7:24-30) are exceptions. Paul first went to the Jews and preached the good news to them. And only then, when they would not listen to him did he go to the pagans (cf Acts 13:46). Luke with today's gospel wants to show that the Jews would lastly reject Jesus and thus the gospel would go to the nations. We can ask ourselves: Did it have to happen that way? Could the Jews not have accepted the gospel from the beginning already? Did and do they have to be stimulated to jealousy, seeing that pagans join the Church as Paul puts it in Rom 9-11? This gives us an opportunity to meditate on the call to universalism, mercy for all and on the other hand criticism of those who do not follow God's call, as we find it in the life of Jeremiah and Jesus, and a call which results in narrow-mindedness, as it happened with the Jews.
I. Every man of God is called by God in a special way.
1. He is elected out of many, often irrespective of his qualities.
a. Jeremiah humanly speaking was not the best qualified to preach, at least if we can believe his words: "Ah, Lord, God! I know not how to speak; I am too young (Jer 1:6)” He was bashful, shy, withdrawn, melancholic. Nonetheless, God called him as a "prophet to the nations" (1:5).
b. Israel
was called to be a chosen people of God because God elected it not because of
any particular merits but because of God's special love. Ezekiel describes it
very vividly: "By origin and birth you are of the land of Canaan; your
father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite” (Ez 15:3). That means, there
is no reason to brag: the forefathers were half pagan. "As for your birth,
the day you were born your navel cord was not cut; you were neither washed with
water nor anointed, nor were you rubbed with salt, nor swathed in swaddling
clothes. No one looked on you with pity or compassion to do any of these things
to you. Rather, you were thrown out on the ground as something loathsome, the
day you were born. Then I passed by and saw you weltering in your blood. I
swore an oath to you and entered into a covenant with you; you became
mine" (Ez 15:4-9). By nature, Israel was not worth to be looked at. It was
like a child that the
mother did not want but threw away. But God liked the child and made it his
own. — Every elected person will have to say the same with variations.
c. The case was of course different with Christ: He is elected because he is God’s own Son. But in this way he is elected even anybody else.
2. A prophet is a man of the Holy Spirit, endowed with the Holy Spirit, called to be a man of the Holy Spirit.
a. This becomes only indirectly clear with Jeremiah. Spirit and word of God belong intimately together. But Jeremiah is “consecrated” prophet in a ceremony where the Lord extends his hand, touches his mouth and says: “see, I place my words in your mouth! This day I set you over nations and over kingdoms" (Jer 1:9-10).
That is also indirectly means to be endowed with the Holy Spirit becomes clear Jeremiah’s antitype John the Baptist. This is announced to his father Zechariah with the words: "He will be filled with the Holy Spirit from his mother’s womb" (Lk 1:15). The fulfillment is reported in Lk 1:41: Mary with Jesus under her heart enters the house of Elizabeth and greets her. The result is: "The baby (John the Baptist) leap in her womb. Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit." The Baptist and his mother are full of the Holy Spirit. And what is said of him is true also with his type Jeremiah, with any prophet.
b. Jesus
was conceived of the Holy Spirit as the angel Gabriel announced to Mary: “The
Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the most high will overshadow
you" (Lk 1:35). That same Holy Spirit came upon Jesus and he went to the
Jordan to be baptized by John (Lk 3:21-22). By the same Holy Spirit Christ was
led
the devil (Lk 4:1); and Jesus "returned in the power of the Spirit to
Galilee” (Lk 4:14), went to the synagogue of Nazareth and started preaching:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me…to bring glad tidings to the poor" (Lk
4:18= Is 61:1).
3. Especially the Holy Spirit urges a prophet to preach to all nations, and that means to be merciful and universal. The good news is for all, not just for the Jews.
a. In the case of Jeremiah the universality of a prophet was expressed in his call: “I place my words in your mouth! This day I set you over kingdoms" (Jer 1:9-10).
b. It is discussed why the Jews were disappointed with Jesus in Nazareth. Certainly did they not accept his claim to be sent by the Father. How could somebody they knew so well, as they thought, be more than they themselves! They also had liked that Jesus would have started his career in Nazareth, and that he would have performed miracles in their midst. But it was probably also because he changed the message of Isaiah 61:1-2 slightly, but significantly by omitting the part: "to announce a day of vindication by our God" (Is 61:2b). That means in the context of Isaiah, God will punish Israel's enemies as Isaiah describes it in Is 34:8 (Yahweh will punish Bosra and Edom) and Is 63:4 ("a day of revenge was in my mind" Yahweh says).
Christ is the merciful savior. He is not going to take revenge on Israel's enemies, and thus he omits that particular part of the prophet Isaiah. And thus scholars (like Joachim Jeremias Jesus' Promise to the Nations. London: SCM Press, 1967, p. 44f) think, this was the reason why people in Nazareth were astonished, not so much "because of his words full of charm" (as most translation put it), but "because he spoke of the mercy of God." Why should in their opinion the enemies of Israel get away with their sins!
II. To be called was for many Israelites a reason to become exclusivistic. Salvation was only for them and nobody else.
1. Gladly would they apply all the texts of "the Day of the Lord" which speak of God's wrath to their enemies and just wait for the day.
2. Easily would they consider themselves alone called by God and look down on others. This blocked their openness to Christ and his word so that finally they did not accept him.
3. The prophets and Jesus the prophet recognized that being called and elected in a special way is only God's gift, no reward for personal good acts. And everybody who is called is usually called for somebody else, to lead others to the Lord.
4. And that means: to have the courage to tell people their faults, to use constructive criticism, as all the prophets told people their sins and what they would have to change, even if this meant death as a martyr for themselves as most prophets died as martyrs and as Christ did.
5. But a truly called person and prophet equally much believed in God's mercy which gives everybody a chance to change for the better, believed that God can move the hearts and that his salvation is not only for the few elected and called in a special way, but for all.
6. Everybody who has been called by God will gladly consider is erection as God's grace and gift and will be glad when God calls others too and shows his mercy to all.