A Cycle – 12^th Sunday in Ordinary Time 26

Mt.10:26-33

. The need to belong, to be accepted, is a strong human need.  It can also become an obstacle to us becoming strong witnesses and boldly living our faith.  This is particularly true in our teen aged years and an even stronger obstacle as we become adults.  There is overt and subtle pressure to suppress our desire to grow in intimacy with Christ and visibly life it. You do not have to look far to see how that desire impacted the disciples after Jesus’s crucifixion. They hid, worried about their own future.  All of them had been by the side of Christ for three years. They had healed the sick, proclaimed the good news.  Yet each of them hid in fear of reprisal for their belief in Christ. 

WE know the disciples were confused by His crucifixion and by Hie resurrection.  We know they became bold after their experience on Pentecost and their anointing by the Holy Spirit.  The truth is during our earliest years our faith formation we are bold and filled with an absolute belief.  That absolute belief changes as we age and without our knowing it, we are influenced by our misunderstanding of why being bold in proclaiming our belief is important to us. That misunderstanding forces us to be cautious in situations where our belief in Christ may be an obstacle to being accepted.

That need to be accepted is at the root of how we live our relationship with Christ. It motivates us to depend on the law because the law only demands obedience.  Following the law makes us feel acceptable to God because we believe it defines what is and what is not acceptable to God. We also know if we fail there is a remedy available to restore our relationship with God.  Doing our best becomes an acceptable standard because it allows us to maintain a facade acceptable to the world.  It allows us to be included instead of rejected by others.  Did you ever think about how the covenant God made with Abraham had no laws?  The covenant was simple; God would be their God, and they would be his people.  Yes, there were sacrifices but the six hundred laws gave to Moses did not exist. Their way of life was their witness, and it was vastly different than their neighbors.  Yet they readily accepted and sacrificed to the gods of their neighbors.

Yet, God was faithful and constantly invited His chosen people to ‘return to Him with all their hearts.” An invitation that still echoes in our hearts and in our desires. God renewed His covenant with Moes, and the six hundred laws became part of what defined believers in this One God.  Those laws defined what was acceptable to God and what was acceptable in relationships and how to worship. But in one way they were training wheels, forcing us to be disciplined, and creating a desire to go beyond the law and live the spirit of the law.  Remember Jesus constantly broke the law and by doing so He was teaching us God’s desire was for more than for us to become defined by the law. God’s plan was for us to be motivated by a hunger for the peace, confidence, trust in God we lost because of Adam’s sin. 

Believing in Christ demands more than obedience and showing up on Sunday. It demands we stand firm in our belief in Jesus and become bold despite the pressure to remain silent when our beliefs are challenged.  But often we hesitated because the costs are too high. We could lose our jobs, friends and be isolated and ridiculed.  Two examples come to mind of those who would not succumb to the pressure to comply.

Recently in the United States baseball players were forced to wear a patch supporting gay pride. A group of players wrote scripture passages on their caps next to that symbol. They have been admonished, fined and face other actions because they stood up for their faith.  I remember here students here in Brecksville, who started gathering around the flagpole to pray before the first bell rang.  They were willing to be chastised, mocked and ostracized because their faith in Jesus was stronger than the pressure to suppress their faith in Christ.

Those who are willing to never be bold have learned to move from a faith motivated by desire rather than be obedient to laws which can only define sin.  Desire can lead us to intimacy with God.  It is God’s desire for us to move from dependance on the law written on our hearts by the Holy Spirit.  It is that baptism of fire and Spirit Jesus promised us He would send. At some point in our journey to become more than practicing Catholics we must realize we are depending on the faith of our childhood.  We must move from a dependence on the written laws to a sensitivity to the law of the Spirit.  That Spirit the God promised to send us to change our hearts and guide us to holiness. It is the Spirit who makes the spirit of the law alive I, our hearts. When that happens, we move from a faith in what we have learned to a faith we begin to live in.    

That is why Paul could write where there is no law there is no sin because the opposite is true. There is sin even if we have not learned the law governing some action we may take. The Spirit will nudge us the moment we fail to live up to God’s standard of loving God and neighbor. This summer can become a myth moment encountering the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob.  It can be a time for us to become focused on learning to walk in faith rather than a dependance on our own ability to discipline ourselves.  It can be a time of experiencing a new Pentecost in our lives. e. 

We should heed the warnings given to us in today’s readings.  God wants us to enjoy the fullness of life. But that is without sacrificing our need to be constantly living a life that proclaims to everyone we encounter Jesus is Lord of our life. We must not sacrifice our ability to be a motivating factor for those who will suppress their faith to get along.  Boldness encourages boldness, iron sharpen iron and faith helps faith grow in others.