Wisdom 18:6-9
The book of Wisdom was written by a teacher who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, a center of learning for the ancient world. He addresses his writing to a group of Jews in this city who were being tempted to abandon their religious practices and beliefs. To bolster their faith, the author speaks of the memorable night of Passover when the angel of the Lord destroyed the enemies of the Jews.
Hebrews 11:1-2, 8-19
Today and for the next three Sundays, the second reading will be from the letter to the Hebrews. This document was written by an author we do not know to a community we cannot identify. In today’s section, the author encourages the community, whose faith is flagging. Calling to mind Old Testament heroes such as Abraham and Sarah, this passage also offers the only definition of faith in the New Testament.
Luke 12:32-48
Bishop Untener’s Homily
What this Gospel tells us is that we shouldn’t let ourselves be caught off guard when the Lord comes – whether it be when the Lord comes at death, or at the end of time. Be watchful, vigilant.
Now there is a way to deal with this that is very simple – simple because it’s not complicated. We don’t have to try to calculate when the Lord is coming. We don’t have to keep looking over our shoulder to make sure we don’t get caught from behind. All we have to do is recognize that the Lord is with us already. The Lord is with us now.
Here’s an example that will help to bring this out. Let’s say that Jesus Christ – this is all in fantasy – let’s say that Jesus Christ made a cameo appearance to the earth, and spent a week visiting different countries. Now... you discover that he is going to visit your own home town and – you know how famous people sometimes do this – he wanted to visit a home, and there was a drawing, and your home was chosen. Jesus Christ is coming to your home tomorrow.
Imagine what any of us would do. We’d scramble around to clean the place and make all sorts of preparations. I know that if it were announced that he was visiting my office, I’d have to spend half a day straightening out my desk.
We can all imagine how we’d feel if this happened to any of us.
Now here’s the thing. We’d knock ourselves out preparing for the visit... and the truth is, the Lord is already there. The Lord is with us. He told us that: "I am with you all days, even to the end of the age... I am the vine, you are the branches... I will not leave you orphans... I will send my Spirit upon you." The Lord is with me every day in my office, in my car, in my home – every minute of every single day.
So, there’s no need for us to keep looking over our shoulder worried about a thief coming in the night. There’s no need to be frantic about a surprise visit. The Lord and I are together every day, all day.
That’s not complicated. That’s not hard to believe in. We already know it and believe it.
Now, here’s the problem. The problem is trying to take our awareness of the Lord’s presence – for example, when we pray and sense the Lord’s presence with us – the problem is trying to take that awareness into all the other "moments" of a given day. Each day has different sections, different compartments.
In my imagination I wonder if it might be easier if I were a farmer, with a small farm, and I worked it every day. I’m not sure it would be easier, but I think it might be. I’d be close to nature, there would be peace and quiet, I’d be close to the earth and to life in many forms.
But that isn’t the kind of life we lead today. If we have some quiet time for prayer in the morning, we have to move from there into very different compartments of our day. We have to get into our car and deal with traffic. Then we move into all the complexities of our workplace, our family, our relationships, shopping, paying bills, health concerns. Each of these seems almost a different world and we have different ways of acting in each, different values.
If I can put it this way... it’s hard to take the Lord with us into these different spheres. It doesn’t seem that the Lord even belongs in all of them.
We all need to think about that. We all need to find ways to sense the Lord’s presence with us in all the compartments of our life, because that’s where the Lord is. This is something within our reach. It’s not complicated. It’s simply a matter of awareness, consciousness.
The Lord’s presence brings a certain peace, a certain purposefulness to every part of our day. It’s a wonderful way to live. It’s a way of life. We have a name for it. It’s called "holiness."
May today’s Gospel help me and help you keep our lamp burning all day long so that, whatever we do, we experience the Lord’s presence with us.
Originally given on August 12, 2001