Tuesday, 2 December 2014

20140904 FAITH IN GOD’S POWER IN OUR LIVES

20140904 FAITH IN GOD’S POWER IN OUR LIVES

Reading 1, First Corinthians 3:18-23

18 There is no room for self-delusion. Any one of you who thinks he is wise by worldly standards must learn to be a fool in order to be really wise.
19 For the wisdom of the world is folly to God. As scripture says: He traps the crafty in the snare of their own cunning
20 and again: The Lord knows the plans of the wise and how insipid they are.
21 So there is to be no boasting about human beings: everything belongs to you,
22 whether it is Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, the world, life or death, the present or the future -- all belong to you;
23 but you belong to Christ and Christ belongs to God.


Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 24:1-2, 3-4, 5-6

1 [Psalm Of David] To Yahweh belong the earth and all it contains, the world and all who live there;
2 it is he who laid its foundations on the seas, on the flowing waters fixed it firm.
3 Who shall go up to the mountain of Yahweh? Who shall take a stand in his holy place?
4 The clean of hands and pure of heart, whose heart is not set on vanities, who does not swear an oath in order to deceive.
5 Such a one will receive blessing from Yahweh, saving justice from the God of his salvation.
6 Such is the people that seeks him, that seeks your presence, God of Jacob.


Gospel, Luke 5:1-11

1 Now it happened that he was standing one day by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the crowd pressing round him listening to the word of God,
2 when he caught sight of two boats at the water's edge. The fishermen had got out of them and were washing their nets.
3 He got into one of the boats -- it was Simon's -- and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat.
4 When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, 'Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.'
5 Simon replied, 'Master, we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I will pay out the nets.'
6 And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear,
7 so they signalled to their companions in the other boat to come and help them; when these came, they filled both boats to sinking point.
8 When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.'
9 For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made;
10 so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching.'
11 Then, bringing their boats back to land they left everything and followed him.

FAITH IN GOD’S POWER IN OUR LIVES
SCRIPTURE READINGS: 1 COR 3:18-23; LK 5:1-11
http://www.universalis.com/20140904/mass.htm
We are rational people.  We want to know everything, understand everything, before we can accept.  There is nothing wrong with this of course.  Being credulous is as dangerous as being incredulous.  We need to be discerning.  But when we become too rationalistic then we reduce faith to reason only.  We become skeptical of everything.  We are skeptical of miracles and the religious experiences of our fellow faith believers.  Some of us may even ridicule their religious encounters.

Indeed, have you ever wondered why the Church has lost its power and influence in the world today?  Just study the life of the apostolic church.  We are told that the early Church attracted much conversion because she exhibited signs and powers.  What has happened to all those signs and wonders that Christ was supposed to work in His Church?  How did the early Church lose her powers?  When it came into contact with the Greek world and its philosophy!  From then on, the Church became more philosophical, grounded on reason rather than on faith.

Yes, like Peter in today’s gospel, most of us rely more on our human effort than on the power of God.  Like Peter, “we worked all night long and caught nothing.” This is true of Paul when he was still Saul.  He was a respectable Pharisee.  We can be sure that Saul was totally committed to the laws.  He was also a great theologian.  But he relied on himself and his own efforts. The truth is that in our Churches, we have plenty of activitiesBut these activities are humanly motivated, they are empty and bereft of the power of God.  We manage the Church more like an organization rather than by the power of the Spirit.  That is why the Church is still not a powerful witness of God’s presence.  Indeed, Paul tells us in the second reading, “there is nothing to boast about in anything human.”  Consequently, like Peter, we reduce Jesus to the level of a master of ethics.

What do we need to recover the power of God working in our lives?  We need what I call a “humiliating experience”, the kind of experience that Peter had. Now, we know that Peter was an experienced fisherman.  Certainly, we can presume that he knew all the tricks and trade of fishing.  Now, when Jesus asked him to pay out the nets for a catch again, Peter reluctantly acquiesced.  After all, he said, “Master we have worked hard all night long and caught nothing … but … if you say so, I will pay out the nets.”   Most probably, Peter was simply giving face to Jesus because He was considered a respectable teacher by the crowd.  But can we surmise in his mind that Peter must be thinking “what does this son of a carpenter know about fishing?” Perhaps, Peter did what Jesus told him to do only to prove Him wrong and embarrass Jesus.

But instead Jesus proved him wrong.  Peter must have been extremely embarrassed.  That is why he fell at his knees in shame and awe and said, “Leave me, Lord, I am a sinful man.”   When Peter said that he was sinful, he was not speaking about a moral ethical sinfulness.  Rather, he was speaking about his arrogant, proud and haughty attitude towards the power of God.  For once, he realized his nothingness.  Hence, Paul tells us that one must “learn to be a fool before he really can be wise!”  These words of Paul summarize his own experience at Damascus.  He, too, had a humiliating experience in his encounter with the Risen Lord on his way to persecute the Christians in Jerusalem.  That encounter with the Lord awakened him to his nothingness.  For this reason, he told the Corinthians, “You belong to Christ and Christ belongs to God.”  In other words, we are nothing; we are nobody.

Now the same thing will also happen to us.  Those of us who are so skeptical of the work of God in the lives of people will one day be put to shame. There was a man in his 60’s whom I got to know at one of the parishes I was attached to. He was a devout Catholic but very skeptical of people who have religious experiences.  He would ridicule and make fun of those who have the gift of tears, or when they rested in the Spirit etc.  Furthermore, he was every inch a man – very macho-looking at that.  One day, when he was praying before the statue of our Lady, he started to cry profusely.  He was so embarrassed because he believed that a man must not cry!  And he came to see me, “Father, what is happening? I can’t control my tears.  They well up so suddenly and apparently without any reason.  Why?  Father, why?”  From that day on, he never made fun of others who had religious experiences anymore.

Yes, this will also happen to those of us who are so skeptical of miracles. One day, when we ourselves have such humiliating and overwhelming experiences, we will feel so stupid, because we will discover that “the wisdom of this world is foolishness to God.”  In reality, we all have had such experiences already. The difference between Peter, Paul and us is that they could remember their experiences with the Lord, whereas we often forget about such experiences.  Our memories of the marvellous works that God has done for us in our lives are too short-lived.

However, if we remember such humiliating and awesome experiences, then something more important will take effect in our lives as it did for Peter.  For Jesus told Peter after that experience:  “Do not be afraid, from now on it is men you will catch.”  Indeed, once we encounter the Lord, our lives will be changed.  We will have no more fear.  Not only that, we will realize our real mission in life.  We will not be like Peter, simply catching fish, but catching men.  In other words, we will not simply be satisfied with a few successful projects, but we will be conquering the hearts of men and women for Christ.  We will be working signs and wonders in the lives of people.  This is the power that Christ has given to us.

So what must we do?  Paul says, “if any one of you thinks of himself as wise … then he must learn to be a fool before he really can be wise.”  In other words, like Peter, we must leave everything behind and follow Jesus.  Yes, we must recognize our nothingness and surrender ourselves totally to the person of Jesus, because God can only work through and in us when we do.  So long as we can rely on ourselves, God will not intervene in our lives.  But the moment we allow His Spirit to operate, He will work wonders beyond our imagination, as Paul wrote in his letter to the Ephesians.

WRITTEN BY THE MOST REV WILLIAM GOH
ARCHBISHOP OF SINGAPORE
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

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