HOMILY WEEK 20 02 – Year I
Humble Faith and Spiritual Warfare:
(Judges 6:11-24; Ps 85; Mt 19:23-30)
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August 21, 2017, was a memorable day for millions of people in North America as they witnessed a solar eclipse – total for some and partial for many more. That experience elicited some very interesting responses such as “Awesome, life-changing, beyond words, humbling.” One television channel played an old pop song “Eclipse of the Heart” as we viewed the celestial phenomenon.
The readings today invite us to have humble faith, experience an eclipse of the heart and prepare for spiritual warfare.
In the middle of today’s gospel, Jesus tells Peter and his disciples, “Truly I tell you, at the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man is seated on the throne of his glory, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.” Can you imagine how the disciples might have felt about that celestial phenomenon!
God’s goal is the renewal of all things, re-creation. Someday all of creation will be renewed, far surpassing a solar eclipse. That divine process has already begun in the life and work of Jesus. We are to participate in that process here and now through humble faith and spiritual warfare.
Our participation is a response to God’s call to us, just as God called Gideon in the first reading. There is a paradox in that call that demands a closer look. The angel of the Lord addresses Gideon as a “warrior,” commissions him to do battle, promising him victory against the Midianites, and backs that claim up with a miraculous sign. Gideon then builds an altar to the Lord and calls it, “The Lord is peace.” How can an angel of God breathe war and peace in almost the same sentence?
The answer is that all the violence in the Old Testament is meant to be interpreted metaphorically and symbolically. The enemies of Israel are really the enemy within us – our sin, sinfulness, defects of character and negative attitudes like false pride and stubbornness and even our addictions. All of that has to be destroyed as we cannot drag any of it into heaven, into the “renewal of all things.” That is the spiritual warfare that Gideon’s commission symbolizes. It is like the disclaimer after a movie such as War Horse – no horses were injured or killed in the making of this movie.
Those who get this meaning the most are recovering alcoholics who know they can’t have an ounce of alcohol in their system or they are dead. A friend shared with me once how much of a shock it was to his system when he took communion in an Eastern rite celebration and realized that it was not just mild wine! He really had to struggle with the fact that he had even tasted hard liquor and totally rely on his faith not to slip and relapse. Our struggle is to let go of our pet sins and vices and truly die to them so that we can already taste the joy of the kingdom, of the “renewal of all things.”
Like Gideon, we can all say that we are not worthy, that we are the least of all. God still calls us, and especially the least, because then God’s power can work through us. Jesus promises eternal life to all those who will follow him and do his work.
The way God renews all things is through humble faith. Our weakness, not our strength, is the criteria. That is why Jesus would say that it is harder for a rich (proud) person to enter the kingdom than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. The key is humble faith strong enough to practice the spirituality of letting go – letting go of our sin, sinfulness, inordinate attachments and addictions. That same friend reflected how in his experience it was the poor who were grateful for even the crumbs that come their way, much more so than the rich, because they have little else and especially no resources of their own that they can rely on.
A Sufi saying adds an appropriate emphasis on this point: “I was a revolutionary when I was young and prayed to God to give me the energy to change the world. In middle age, realizing half a lifetime was gone without changing a single person, I changed my prayer to, ‘Lord, give me the grace to change all those who come into contact with me, just my family and friends, and I’ll be satisfied.’ Now that I am old and my days are numbered, my one prayer is, ‘Lord, give me the grace to change myself.’ If I had prayed for this right from the start, I should not have wasted my life.”
Gideon recognized the angel of the Lord when fire consumed his gift of bread and wine. We also are called to even greater faith, as we recognize and receive Jesus in these gifts of bread and wine, without fire, without sensationalism – just quiet humble faith at work.
May our celebration today help transform us into the Body of Christ, into that new creation, into the renewal of all things, so that we can go out to help renew our families, our communities and our world.
