Identity and Mission

The psalmist from the texts of the Roman Catholic Lectionary today presents the way whereby we can approach God when we are aware of our own distance from the life giving mission in which we are continuously invited to live. We begin in thanksgiving. The episode in the Book of Exodus of the encounter between God and Moses at Mount Horeb, which is outside Egypt on the Sinai peninsula, is preceded by the story of the gratitude which Moses father-in-law expressed to him by giving Moses his daughter in marriage. With gratitude to God for his position as shepherd of the flocks of Jethro, Moses is attracted to the manifestation of God in the burning bush. God addresses the guilt and sense of inadequacy of Moses by making it clear that the instrument of the mission to free His people Israel from the oppression of the Egyptians is the unworthy one, Moses. The people of Corinth to whom Paul writes were in difficulty because self centered attitudes and practices were moving them to consider the messages of other spiritual guides who were arguing that their desires for self service could be accommodated in their search for spiritual enlightenment. Paul cites the experience of the Israelites as the complaining and selfish desires of some prevented them from attaining the promise of the mission of exodus through which God was leading them. In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus uses the example of grave consequences which fell upon some Jewish people who appeared, in popular opinion, to be condemned as grievous sinners, to instruct us that our mission to bear fruit of love, compassion and forgiveness is routed in our own attraction to God and is constantly nourished by the Shepherd to be life giving.