FULFILLED RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW!
[BREAKING THE BREAD OF GOD’S WORD]
3rd Sunday OT_C
FULFILLED RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW!
There was a motley crowd before Ezra like
we are told in the first reading … men, women, and children. We are told, furthermore, that “all the
people listened attentively to the book of the Law.”
No one was considered dispensable. Each one
was deemed important and not disposable. But so, too, was the Word of the Lord.
Every word, every phrase, every sentence counted.
Every member, every part, every person
counts, too, as far as all three readings are concerned. This much, St. Paul
assures us: no part of the body that makes up one whole can say “I quit,”
without affecting the totality, the whole, the integrity of the one body that
makes up who everyone is, in God’s plan.
Totality … integrity … wholeness …
completenens … these are all words that come in handy in today’s reflection on
the readings. This is the same integrity and fullness that the Word of the Lord
carries … not a letter, not an iota, not a punctuation is to be done away with, and considered trivial
and unimportant.
The law of the Lord is perfect, refreshing
the soul … Not a phrase, not a word, not a letter is useless and out of place.
Galilee was, for the worldly wise, probably
a forgettable place. The temple wasn’t there. The seat of power was by no means
attached to the place. It was backwater, unimportant, and insignificant.
But the God who loves wholes and totalities
and who loves even the unlovable and the forgettable never for a moment thought
that Galilee could be dispensed with at anytime.
Jesus went back there. Jesus healed people
there. Jesus ministered to the least, the lowest, the last, and the probably
the lost. He deemed it proper to go to a synagogue and do an important reading
of a passage that summed up what he has come to the world for.
And he did it, just where people needed it
most – in a place that did not occupy an important place the in the hearts and
thoughts of those who roamed around the corridors of power and prestige.
This is good news for me. I am
insignificant. I am unknown and unimportant. I am one of the hoi polloi, with
hardly any influence, with not much power to speak of, with nothing that I
could boast of, except for my sins!
But it is good news for me because Jesus
very clearly came for the likes of me. He came for people not unlike me. And he
announced it at a place that didn’t reek too much of important, significance,
and power.
Being whole means precisely this … nothing
is disposable, throwable and worthless. This is what Paul, too, wanted to say.
Every part is parcel of the whole, and not one part can say, “I am out of
here.”
We all make one body. We all form the
Church that is the Body of Christ. And everyone, every part, every member
counts as far as the Lord is concerned. Just like the Word of God, every word,
every utterance, every letter of the law and the totality of the law is
perfect, refreshing the soul. His
decrees are trustworthy, and his handiwork that is each and everyone of us, is
called to greatness.
I know of nothing else. I am convinced of
nothing more than this great news. I am part of Christ’s body, the Church, and
the Lord has found me significant and salvation-worthy enough for him to pass
by a lonely church called a synagogue to announce the greatest news – liberty
to captives, recovery of sight to the blind, freedom to the oppressed, and the
proclamation of a year of favor from the Lord.
The best news on top of all this?
It is now happening right here, right now …
right where we are.
The Lord’s words are being fulfilled right
in our hearing and in our presence. What more are you looking for?
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