Thirty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time
Recently, there has been stunning news about extra-terrestrial discoveries. Scientists are telling us that in the last few years they have discovered expoplanets. Exoplanets, or alien planets, are those planets that exist outside of our Solar System but have their own stars like we have ours. So far, scientists have discovered 1,028 confirmed exoplanets. The reason for beginning my homily this way is to impress upon you a sense of perspective. From the perspective of recent discoveries, the earth is like a speck of dust. And in relation to the magnitude of planet earth, each of us is speck of dust. So really, human beings are specks within a speck. Yet, inside us is a whole world, a universe, a cosmos. How the vastness of the universe somehow connects with the world within us – this is a fascinating thought.
If I have succeeded in creating any sense of perspective in you, then let us go a step further. If the universe with planets and expoplanets is so unimaginably expansive, then what must God who created it all, be like? (By the way, I am not even considering a Godless creation because I simply am a believer). Lets hear what today’s first reading from the book of wisdom says: “Before the LORD the whole universe is as a grain from a balance or a drop of morning dew come down upon the earth.” I am baffled that in Old Testament times with comparatively little cosmological knowledge, the author of the Book of Wisdom already had a sense of perspective. The author could not but dwell on the mystery of the connection between the awesomeness of God how it all related to the universe and the human person.
Today, in my three points, I want to reflect on having a certain perspective in matters relating to God. Today’s first reading from the book of Wisdom offers us three perspectives: a personal God, a God who calls, and a God who saves.
1) A Personal God. The one thing that separated Hebrew faith from its contemporaries was the concept of God. The Old Testament revealed a personal God in love with human beings and their world. Hear one more time what the Book of Wisdom says,
“But you [God] have mercy on all, because you can do all things;
and you overlook people's sins that they may repent.
For you love all things that are
and loathe nothing that you have made;
for what you hated, you would not have fashioned.
For the Hebrew people, God was not one among the pantheon of gods, each representing a facet of the cosmos. The God of the Bible is above creation. God choose to create the universe, the world, everything in it as an act of goodness. And God loved what God created because creation was God’s self-expression. This is more so in the case of human persons because they are in created in God’s image and likeness. And this precisely is the reason that Wisdom suggests that God is in love with the world and us – because creation is God’s work, God’s self-expression, a part of God’s very image.
2) A God who calls. Again, wisdom says,
And how could a thing remain, unless you [God] willed it;
or be preserved, had it not been called forth by you?
This verse is still talking about God’s initial act of creation but takes us further in our knowledge of God. God does not just create the world. God calls it forth. Calling implies purpose and meaning. From this perspective creation is not just floating in some timeless and senseless fashion. All of creation is moving toward the end destined by God who created it. Again, this is particularly true of human beings. God does not just create us but calls us forth. Every human person is called by God. And this calling is what gives human life its primary meaning and purpose. From a Christian perspective this is doubly significant because God sent Jesus to infuse human life with divine meaning and purpose. Jesus’s life, death and resurrection reveal the ultimate meaning, purpose and destiny of human life. Somehow, we have to find the relationship between life here on earth and God’s call. This is what Paul is praying for the Thessalonians as he says in today’s second reading, “We always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and powerfully bring to fulfillment every good purpose….” As each of us lives our life, as we work and enhance God’s creation, as we form families and communities, as we encounter joy and pain, life and death, good and evil, the hope is that we are doing so as response to God’s call.
3) A God who saves. Once again, let us her the last section of today’s first reading:
“But you spare all things, because they are yours,
O LORD and lover of souls,
for your imperishable spirit is in all things!
Therefore you rebuke offenders little by little,
warn them and remind them of the sins they are committing,
that they may abandon their wickedness and believe in you, O LORD!”
The story of Zacchaeus in today’s gospel reading is a powerful story of both the limitations of human nature and the transforming mercy of God. Yes, God has created us and God has called us but sometimes we fail to realize that call. But, if only we can turn our vision toward God, God reaches out to us in the same way that Jesus reaches out to Zacchaeus. Jesus says to Zacchaeus on the tree, "Come down quickly, today, I am must stay at your house.” This experience of God is so powerful for Zacchaeus that it changes his life. In Jesus, Zacchaeus has encountered what Wisdom calls the “lover of souls.” He is transformed by the mercy of God. Zacchaeus now finds a new world both within himself and without. Not only does he surrender to God but he reconciles with those he has hurt and wronged. Finally, he has found a new meaning and purpose for his life. So Jesus says, “Today, salvation has come to this house. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost." Our God is a God who saves!
This Eucharist we celebrate is a celebration of a personal God who calls us and saves us. We cannot lose this perspective.
- Fr. Satish Joseph