Deciding and Doing

3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Jonah3, 1-5, 10 / 1Cor 7, 29-31 / Mark 1, 14-20

Some things stand out about all of today’s readings.  First of all, they are all brief readings – not long at all.  Also, each reading is about responding to a call.  So you’ll be happy to know I want to imitate our readings by trying to be brief and direct.  And too, I want to imitate them by talking about our response to God’s call to each of us.

Probably we have all heard the story of Jonah before.  It’s the tale of Jonah, who’s a prophet, getting caught in the belly of a whale.  But what you may not know – but may have suspected – is that it’s a completely made-up story – a comic tale – a biblical comedy intended to make us laugh and cry – basically at ourselves.  It’s a story intended to show us up to ourselves: to show us the lengths we will go to avoid God’s call to us.  So the story goes: Jonah is called by God to convert the people of Nineveh.  He doesn’t want to go.  He hates the people of Nineveh; they’re not Jews.  So he goes in the very opposite direction of where Nineveh sits – eventually gets sucked into the belly of a whale – and then gets spit out onto the shore facing in the right direction toward Nineveh.  So finally Jonah, the unwilling prophet, goes where God has wanted him to go all along.

Now a direct question to each of us!  It’s truth time!  People in 12 Step recovery programs remind us that Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt.  Are there things – good and worthy things – that each of us feels called upon to try to do?  And yet we avoid them – we deny them – we run away from them?  The call to do the good and worthy thing is clearly of God.  It’s God’s call to us.  Now we might laugh at ourselves and cry too, as the story of Jonah would have us do.  But like Jonah we might also finally give in to God – give in to God’s call.  Let us respond and do what is worthy and noble.  That is God’s call to each of us.

In our second reading Paul tells the Christians in Corinth that time is running out for them.  They made the decision to follow Christ.  And so their world should be changing.  Much of their old world and old way of life should be passing away.  Paul calls on them to actually live out of their baptism.

Another direct question to each of us!  Would an outside observer see a difference in us – a difference in our lives and behavior – due to the fact we call Jesus of Nazareth “Lord”?  What’s our honest answer?  Truth time!  Does what we say as Christians make any difference in what we do as human beings – as Americans – as neighbors – as parishioners?

We come to the reading from the gospel of Mark.  It’s the first gospel to be written down.  At the very beginning of the gospel – at the very beginning of Jesus’ public ministry Mark sums up what it all means to respond to the call of Jesus – what it means to be a disciple of Jesus.  The scene shows Jesus calling out to Peter and Andrew, to James and John – just as surely he calls out to us – saying: Change your ways,[and]put your trust in the good news!

Direct question:  Where do I really put my trust?  Do I put my trust in Jesus’ words and wisdom – really?  Do I commit to what he called “the Kingdom of God” – where we give daily bread to one another – where we forgive one another’s sins, forgive when sinned against – where we do not sit in judgment of one another? 

I repeat: Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt.  And “Thy Kingdom come” ain’t just words in a prayer.  They are words aching to become our agenda – our hope – our passion.  They’re words that want to get us out of bed in the morning.

It’s all kind of simple.  Jonah, Paul – Jesus – they are all telling us: Give in to God!  Answer his call!  It’s being spoken to each of us deep-down.  Listen for it!  Let our spoken faith really shape our lived life.  Let us answer Jesus’ call to us.  Let us change our ways by entrusting ourselves to Jesus’ ways.  Let us become real disciples.

Fr. Pat Earl, SJ