Contenders and Apostles

In the texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today, we encounter Contenders and Apostles who are players in a much larger plan of God.

Since we are surrounded by so Great a cloud of Witnesses, lay aside every weight & let us run to endure the race set before us~Hebrews 12~👑 pic.twitter.com/r7NujPBYll

— S.Lewis (@SLewis_76) January 13, 2018

In the First Letter of Samuel, the tension between King Saul and contenter for the throne, David, peaks with an decision to save the life of Saul.

* [24:1] The first of two accounts (see chap. 26) in which David spares Saul’s life. The two accounts, which do not make reference to each other, are probably alternative versions of the same story.

In the Gospel from Mark, Jesus includes some followers in the role of envoys as He calls them by name.

* [3:14–15] He appointed twelve [whom he also named apostles] that they might be with him: literally “he made,” i.e., instituted them as apostles to extend his messianic mission through them (Mk 6:7–13). See notes on Mt 10:1 and 10:2–4.

Barbara Dilly bridges the Hebrew Testament and the Gospel with the observation that we are always part of a drama much bigger than ourselves.

God confronts us in these moments of insecurity and gently reminds us that God is more concerned with our lack of faith in God's purposes than with evil doers of our definition.  In these moments of challenge, God bids us to go about our work, using any power and privilege we have to further God's purposes.  The act on our insecurities is a waste of our talents, our power, our privilege and a betrayal of the Christ who reconciles all things to himself.

Don Schwager reminds us that Jesus chose very ordinary people.

They were non-professionals, who had no wealth or position. They were chosen from the common people who did ordinary things, had no special education, and no social advantages. Jesus wanted ordinary people who could take an assignment and do it extraordinarily well. He chose these men, not for what they were, but for what they would be capable of becoming under his direction and power

Friar Jude Winkler describes how Saul encounters David and explains his respect for God’s choice as King. Calling Judas as an Apostle was not a mistake but part of God’s larger purpose.

Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, comments that Jesus seems to be saying that God is not a philosophical system, a theory to be proven, or an energy to be discussed or controlled, although we have often reduced God to each of these.

In the biblical tradition, we only seem to know God by relating to God face to face, almost as if God refuses to be known apart from love. It is all about relationship. As Martin Buber (1878-1965), the Jewish philosopher mystic, put it, “All real living is meeting.” [2] It is the “face to face” religion that began with Moses (see Exodus 33:11). The face of human suffering is the same whether it belongs to a Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, Jew, or Christian, to a person who’s gay or straight, who’s a believer or an unbeliever. If we don’t see this, it’s because we haven’t risked looking into the suffering face of another.

Our personal relationship with the face of God in our lives is a glimpse into a universe where in our part is often mysterious as the the choice of the Divine to be intimately connected to our being.