Commentary
Sunday, 8/20/2017, Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time
A House of Prayer for All Peoples
First Reading Commentary: Isaiah 56:1, 6-7
Christ instructed the Apostles to go and teach all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. He made it clear that His Church was not exclusive to any one group of people but for everyone. Christ did not limit His Saving Grace to any one group of people. Instead, Christ came to save us all.
These facts were not made new with the coming of Christ. It was God’s plan all along and that plan is the message in today’s prophecy from Isaiah.
This is a truth which we do not always consider because we sometimes allow ourselves to become caught up in the words which in turn causes us to miss the message. When we look at the history of the Israelites in the Old Testament, we can be easily misled into believing that only they could enter the Promised Land. When we look at Christ and the history of Christianity, we can be misled into believing that the Son changed the Father’s plan and that only Christians can enter the Kingdom of Heaven.
The truth is that we are all God’s children and anyone who loves and obeys God because of their faith in Him is promised salvation. It is also the truth that God wants everyone to be with Him in His Kingdom—not just any one group of people.
Anyone who believes that their religion is the only religion through which one can be saved is completely out of touch with today’s message from Isaiah. Worse yet, they are completely out of touch with the fact that God wants all of His children to come home to Him. It is for that reason that we cannot assume that because someone practices a different religion from our own that they cannot get to heaven. Nevertheless, in our broken humanity, we often times consider people who practice a different religion, spiritually, as foreigners.
In the Old Testament, one could argue that a Non-Israelite is a foreigner. In the New Testament, one could argue that a Non-Christian is a foreigner. Fact is that we are all foreigners because this world is not our eternal home. The Israelites were foreigners and in their Exodus they journeyed to the Promised Land of Jerusalem. We—all of humanity, are all foreigners while we journey in our Exodus from this life to eternal life in the Promised Land of heaven.
This is what Isaiah is telling us when he relates God’s message by saying, “Thus says the LORD…The foreigners who join themselves to the LORD…loving the name of the LORD, and becoming his servants…them I will bring to my holy mountain and make joyful in my house of prayer…for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.”
Jealousy Makes Them Want What You Have
Second Reading Commentary: Romans 11:13-15, 29-32
I have heard it preached, that if you are filled with the Holy Spirit and you let your fulfillment radiate from within you in everything that you say and do, the people who you come into contact with will want what you have. If God is alive inside of you and you are allowing God to carry out His Will through you, then you are happy and at peace and nothing seems: to worry you.
The people around you may not understand that it is God working within you but they will want to be like you. So, they will make every effort to figure it out and when they realize that it is the Spirit of God within you, they will want to be filled by the Spirit too. This is what Paul is saying today in his letter to the Romans.
Paul testified that he was the apostle to the Gentiles and took glory in his ministry to the Gentiles so that the non-believing Jews may become jealous thereby wanting the same saving grace that the Gentiles were enjoying.
We don’t think of making another person jealous as being a good thing. But this is yet another example that just as the devil will use good things against us to lead us into sin, God will use bad things to bring about His Will. Paul understood this which is why he pointed out that the rejection of the Jews was the reconciliation of the world but their acceptance would be life from the dead.
The Jews rejected Christ and had Him crucified. But Christ took the sins of the world to the cross with Him and with His Resurrection, He defeated death. Paul knew that the Jews who still did not accept Christ after the Resurrection could still gain eternal life in heaven if they became believers and so he used jealousy as a means to win some of them over. Like Christ, Paul’s intent was to reach out to everyone even though his ministry was to the Gentiles.
Paul pointed out that God’s gifts are irrevocable. In other words, what God gives us is ours to keep. Gifts that come from the Holy Spirit, such as faith, cannot be taken away. Whether or not we accept them and use them is another matter but no one and nothing can take them away.
Paul said, “For God delivered all to disobedience, that he might have mercy upon all.” This does not mean that God wants us to disobey Him and spend our lives in sin so that, because of His pride, He can show mercy. Nothing can be farther from the truth. The Almighty does not need pride and I see that fact as one of the reasons why pride is a deadly sin which has no place in heaven.
From the very first sin of Adam and Eve, mankind was doomed to be in sin and we are all sinners. We are totally incapable of saving ourselves and there is only one way for us to achieve eternal life. Receiving God’s mercy is that way. God's mercy is available to everyone and is made possible because of the death and Resurrection of the Son.
Persistence, Faith and Power
Gospel Commentary: Matthew 15: 21-28
A Canaanite woman from the region of Tyre and Sidon called out to Jesus saying that her daughter was tormented by a demon. The disciples asked Jesus to send her away and Jesus said in reply, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But the woman came up to Him and said, “Lord help me.” He said to her, “It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.” The woman said, “Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.” Jesus said, “O woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” The daughter was healed from that hour.
The first thing that we need to consider in this gospel is that the woman was a Gentile and that the term, “dog” was a word of contempt used by the Jews for Gentiles. So did Jesus mean to be offensive to the woman? Of course not! Jesus knew her faith and He used this experience as an opportunity to make several points.
Jesus dedicated His mission while He was on earth to the Jews but He came to save all of mankind which is why He told the Apostles to go and teach all nations and why He told Paul to specifically go to the Gentiles. By performing this miracle for this woman, Jesus put His words into action proving that His salvation was not limited to the Jews and that His saving grace was for everyone.
Jesus used this and several other events to teach us that God does not prejudge anyone nor does God engage in any actions or even thoughts that lead to any sort of hate driven discrimination or separation among people of different backgrounds or beliefs.
The woman did more than demonstrate her own faith with her comment to Jesus about dogs eating the scraps from their master’s plates. Her comment points to the fact that there were Gentiles who knew about Jesus and believed in Him.
In Luke 1:11-13, Jesus teaches us how to pray and in that gospel, Jesus told us to ask, seek and knock teaching us to be persistent. In today's gospel, Jesus does not tell us to be persistent with our prayers; He demonstrates that persistence will pay off.
We have an awesome God whose power is limitless. The daughter was healed from that hour. Imagine, Jesus never saw the girl and was not in her presence. This was not simply a case of a sick person being cured even though they were not in Jesus’ presence. This was a demon that was driven out of the girl. Jesus does not have to physically be with us to perform great works for us but we do have to be with Him in faith.
“O Woman, great is your faith,” Jesus said. Faith is the key to having our prayers answered. Anything is possible if we believe and with belief comes the persistence to not give up. When God sees this in us, great things do happen.
