OUR BEST WORLD
12th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Mark 4: 35-41
We cannot have the best of both worlds. But we can have a better world if we have Him who turns the worst of situations into the best. It is Jesus, and Jesus alone, who makes of our moments of crisis moments of grace. In Him is found the best of both worlds.
What seems to be the end of the road for us, is just a bend for Jesus. What appears for us as death is just the beginning of real life for Him. What we consider to be a moment of despair is for Jesus, an opportune time of faith. It is kairos. It is a moment of grace.
Thus, when we are sick, problematic, betrayed, abandoned or dying, and think that we are condemned to pain, endless anxiety, loneliness, helplessness or total annihilation, let us keep our focus on Jesus. He is not asleep; the waves that make our sailing rough keep Him awake. He knows. He understands. He feels. He listens. He moves. All that He asks from us is to give all our cares to Him because He cares for us. And unless we keep our faith in Him in the midst of the threatening waves and the strong winds in our life, there is no way by which we realize that indeed He can give us the best of both worlds.
To have faith in Jesus is to believe. Belief is a way of knowing not by physical evidence. We come to believe because of the testimonies of those who came to believe first. Mark, our evangelist today, is one of them. He gives us in the Gospel today one of the most dramatic and powerful story of the true identity of Jesus. Jesus is truly man; thus, Mark paints for us in the Gospel today a Jesus who is greatly exhausted and asleep after a long day of preaching and healing. Jesus is truly God; thus Mark describes to us in the same Gospel how Jesus calms the wind and the sea by a mere command.
The whole of Mark’s Gospel revolve around one and only one issue: Who is Jesus? Supported by historical data and miraculous accounts in the life of Jesus, Mark, writing to believers in Rome when the widespread persecution of Christians began in 64 A.D., tries to encourage the latter to remain steadfast in the faith. He proclaims that truly the man called “Jesus”, whom he and the persecuted believe in, is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.
We may not be persecuted on account of our faith as the early Christians were. But certainly our faith is challenged on many occasions, most especially when life seems to be unfair with us and trials blur our vision of God’s loving hands upon us. Sometimes, like the disciples in the Gospel today, we say, “Lord, do you not care?”
Faith is the ascent of the mind. It is believing unconditionally. But we must believe only he who knows the truth and is truthful. Knowing the truth does not always mean being truthful. It is dangerous to believe in someone who knows the truth but is not truthful and it is foolishness to believe in someone who is truthful but does not know the truth.
Faith is the confidence of the heart. It is trusting unconditionally. But we should trust only he who can and who cares. Having the power to do what one says is not the same as having the love to do it. Thus, when a five-year-old kid tells his father to jump from the top of a staircase, his father does not jump, unless his father is a fool. Certainly, the child cares for his father but the same child simply cannot catch his father when his father jumps from the top of a staircase. However, it is equally suicidal to trust someone who simply cares but cannot. Someone may have the power and ability to catch you when you jump from the top of a staircase but if that someone happens to be someone you have grievously wronged, you would most probably think more than twice if you are to jump because you wonder if that someone really cares enough to catch you when you fall.
When faith has a mind and a heart, when truly it means believing and trusting, then it struggles to have hands and feet. When this happens, faith is not merely the ascent of the mind and the confidence of the heart, it grows into the submission of the will. This submission of the will is clearly manifested in loving obedience.
While other human individuals may prove to be worth our belief, worth our trust, and worth our loving obedience, Jesus stands out among all of them. He is not merely human. He is divine.
We cannot have the best of both worlds but in both worlds Jesus can always give us the best. You see, it is not in both worlds where our true joy and unfailing security rest. It is in Jesus, the Christ, the Son of the Living God. Unless we have enough faith in Him, we cannot even have what is better in either world. Without Jesus, we can only have the worst.
Mark 4: 35-41
We cannot have the best of both worlds. But we can have a better world if we have Him who turns the worst of situations into the best. It is Jesus, and Jesus alone, who makes of our moments of crisis moments of grace. In Him is found the best of both worlds.
What seems to be the end of the road for us, is just a bend for Jesus. What appears for us as death is just the beginning of real life for Him. What we consider to be a moment of despair is for Jesus, an opportune time of faith. It is kairos. It is a moment of grace.
Thus, when we are sick, problematic, betrayed, abandoned or dying, and think that we are condemned to pain, endless anxiety, loneliness, helplessness or total annihilation, let us keep our focus on Jesus. He is not asleep; the waves that make our sailing rough keep Him awake. He knows. He understands. He feels. He listens. He moves. All that He asks from us is to give all our cares to Him because He cares for us. And unless we keep our faith in Him in the midst of the threatening waves and the strong winds in our life, there is no way by which we realize that indeed He can give us the best of both worlds.
To have faith in Jesus is to believe. Belief is a way of knowing not by physical evidence. We come to believe because of the testimonies of those who came to believe first. Mark, our evangelist today, is one of them. He gives us in the Gospel today one of the most dramatic and powerful story of the true identity of Jesus. Jesus is truly man; thus, Mark paints for us in the Gospel today a Jesus who is greatly exhausted and asleep after a long day of preaching and healing. Jesus is truly God; thus Mark describes to us in the same Gospel how Jesus calms the wind and the sea by a mere command.
The whole of Mark’s Gospel revolve around one and only one issue: Who is Jesus? Supported by historical data and miraculous accounts in the life of Jesus, Mark, writing to believers in Rome when the widespread persecution of Christians began in 64 A.D., tries to encourage the latter to remain steadfast in the faith. He proclaims that truly the man called “Jesus”, whom he and the persecuted believe in, is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.
We may not be persecuted on account of our faith as the early Christians were. But certainly our faith is challenged on many occasions, most especially when life seems to be unfair with us and trials blur our vision of God’s loving hands upon us. Sometimes, like the disciples in the Gospel today, we say, “Lord, do you not care?”
Faith is the ascent of the mind. It is believing unconditionally. But we must believe only he who knows the truth and is truthful. Knowing the truth does not always mean being truthful. It is dangerous to believe in someone who knows the truth but is not truthful and it is foolishness to believe in someone who is truthful but does not know the truth.
Faith is the confidence of the heart. It is trusting unconditionally. But we should trust only he who can and who cares. Having the power to do what one says is not the same as having the love to do it. Thus, when a five-year-old kid tells his father to jump from the top of a staircase, his father does not jump, unless his father is a fool. Certainly, the child cares for his father but the same child simply cannot catch his father when his father jumps from the top of a staircase. However, it is equally suicidal to trust someone who simply cares but cannot. Someone may have the power and ability to catch you when you jump from the top of a staircase but if that someone happens to be someone you have grievously wronged, you would most probably think more than twice if you are to jump because you wonder if that someone really cares enough to catch you when you fall.
When faith has a mind and a heart, when truly it means believing and trusting, then it struggles to have hands and feet. When this happens, faith is not merely the ascent of the mind and the confidence of the heart, it grows into the submission of the will. This submission of the will is clearly manifested in loving obedience.
While other human individuals may prove to be worth our belief, worth our trust, and worth our loving obedience, Jesus stands out among all of them. He is not merely human. He is divine.
We cannot have the best of both worlds but in both worlds Jesus can always give us the best. You see, it is not in both worlds where our true joy and unfailing security rest. It is in Jesus, the Christ, the Son of the Living God. Unless we have enough faith in Him, we cannot even have what is better in either world. Without Jesus, we can only have the worst.
posted by Fr. Bobby @ 3:00 PM
0 Comments
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home