21st Sunday C.
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In today’s first reading God informs the chosen people of Israel, that the Kingdom of God would be thrown open to people from every nation. No doubt many Israelites believed that they alone would know salvation, that God belonged to them. Isaiah ‘s vision told them the opposite.
The glory of God would be witnessed by all nations.
We Catholics can sometimes regard ourselves
as the chosen people of today. We may think that we are nearest to God by virtue of our membership of the Catholic Church. I think Jesus wants us to have cOnfidence in God, to have the sure hope that he will call us his brothers and sisters when it matters most. But he does not want us to take the whole thing for granted, to live as though salvation was in the bag, come what may.
Two weeks ago we heard him say:
“see that you are dressed for action and have your lamps lit”. and ‘Happy the servant whom his master finds at his employment
when he arrives.’
Our employment is knowing the contmandments Jesus gave us and living them out in our lives.
IF we do this all the time,
IF we refer to God and communicate with him in prayer,
IF we recognise and accept correction and the challenge to grow in holiness,
then we are like servants dressed for action with our lamps lit. We will get trough the narrow door because we will be travelling lightly. Nor will we fear that the door is locked in our face for we will always be on the right side of it.
St Paul when speaking to Greeks sometimes used sporting images to illustrate Christian life. Like athletes at the Olympic games we should have a goal and make sacrifices to achieve it.
In his letter to the Corinthians he wrote:
“Do you not realise that, though all the runners in the stadium take part in
the race, only one of them gets the prize?
Run like that - to win.
Every athlete concentrates completely on training,
and that is to win a wreath that will wither,
whereas ours will never wither.
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