I WILL FOLLOW YOU WHEREVER YOU GO – READINESS FOR MISSION
Introduction
Amos scolds the people of God that they have not answered God’s covenant love. Not only should they have responded to God but also shown it to their neighbour.
“Leave the dead to bury their dead.” Though implying total renunciation in the style of the Jewish rabbis, Jesus stresses more making a new beginning, getting uprooted from the past and breaking with it, so as not even to stay at home until one’s father dies, and accepting the insecurity of following Jesus and living the faith consistently and earnestly. Are we consistent? Are we radicals in the sense demands by Jesus?
1 Reading Amos 2:6-10, 13-16
Thus says the LORD:
For three crimes of Israel, and for four,
I will not revoke my word;
Because they sell the just man for silver,
and the poor man for a pair of sandals.
They trample the heads of the weak
into the dust of the earth,
and force the lowly out of the way.
Son and father go to the same prostitute,
profaning my holy name.
Upon garments taken in pledge
they recline beside any altar;
And the wine of those who have been fined
they drink in the house of their god.
Yet it was I who destroyed the Amorites before them,
who were as tall as the cedars,
and as strong as the oak trees.
I destroyed their fruit above,
and their roots beneath.
It was I who brought you up from the land of Egypt,
and who led you through the desert for forty years,
to occupy the land of the Amorites.
Beware, I will crush you into the ground
as a wagon crushes when laden with sheaves.
Flight shall perish from the swift,
and the strong man shall not retain his strength;
The warrior shall not save his life,
nor the bowman stand his ground;
The swift of foot shall not escape,
nor the horseman save his life.
And the most stout-hearted of warriors
shall flee naked on that day, says the LORD.
Responsorial Psalm 50:16bc-17, 18-19, 20-21, 22-23
R. (22a) Remember this, you who never think of God.
“Why do you recite my statutes,
and profess my covenant with your mouth,
Though you hate discipline
and cast my words behind you?”
R. Remember this, you who never think of God.
“When you see a thief, you keep pace with him,
and with adulterers you throw in your lot.
To your mouth you give free rein for evil,
you harness your tongue to deceit.”
R. Remember this, you who never think of God.
“You sit speaking against your brother;
against your mother’s son you spread rumors.
When you do these things, shall I be deaf to it?
Or do you think that I am like yourself?
I will correct you by drawing them up before your eyes.”
R. Remember this, you who never think of God.
“Consider this, you who forget God,
lest I rend you and there be no one to rescue you.
He that offers praise as a sacrifice glorifies me;
and to him that goes the right way I will show the salvation of God.”
R. Remember this, you who never think of God.
Alleluia Psalm 95:8
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
If today you hear his voice,
harden not your hearts.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel Matthew 8:18-22
When Jesus saw a crowd around him,
he gave orders to cross to the other shore.
A scribe approached and said to him,
“Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.”
Jesus answered him, “Foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests,
but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head.”
Another of his disciples said to him,
“Lord, let me go first and bury my father.”
But Jesus answered him, “Follow me,
and let the dead bury their dead.”
Commentary:
Matthew gives us today what Luke gave us yesterday: those two sayings of Jesus. “The Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head,” and “Leave the dead to bury their dead.” It’s not surprising; they are hard to forget.
There is a great fascination about wanderers. While the rest of us hang around a few familiar places, hugging the walls, these free spirits wander wherever their fancy takes them. We would love to have the freedom of the tramp under the bridge, but the price of it is the surrender of security. We would love to have both—freedom and security—but they are incompatible. We don’t want to join the free spirits, but our imagination goes with them. We become restless in an ineffectual way, like farmyard chickens in the migration season.
“Leave the dead to bury their dead.” It sounds heartless. But we mustn’t become too literal; Jesus spoke a poetic language. There is a sad history of unimaginative literal interpretation of the Scriptures. In this case, surely, the man’s father was not dead, but perhaps elderly; and the man was asking if he could wait till after his father’s death. No, said Jesus, come now! Postponement becomes a habit: after his father’s death he would find another reason for delay, and another.
Putting the two sayings together, what do we get? He is saying to us: if you want to be free, be free now!
Blessing
“Follow me,” says Jesus. We have to leave behind everything that is not in conformity with his message. This applies not only to the religious and missionaries. We have to understand and accept that the gospel is radical and asks us at times to take decisions that are even beyond bonds of family and all that is dear to us. May God give you this courage and bless you, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen!