What Is This?

Today we get to see how Jesus deals with those voices in our heads that try to mess with our faith, or our self-worth, or our identity in Christ. These annoying voices sound like doubt in God’s goodness, worship of people and possessions, self-hate, victimhood, blame, shame, you’re not good enough, God doesn’t hear you, etc. They can occupy much landscape in our minds and Jesus simply uses His authority to say, “Quiet! Come out!” I remember when my brother and I were kids and if we happened to be messing around in Church, my dad had one distinct, commanding, oh crap we know we are in big trouble clearing of his voice, that literally would stop us cold from doing whatever it was that we are doing. If we heard that particular sounding voice clearing, we stopped immediately. It came from his authority and we knew that consequences were looming if we did not bend to it. Jesus not only taught “as one having authority”, but He commands anything that is messing with God’s perfect plan of love and mercy to stop immediately. The sound of His voice calms the storm, beckons His sheep, and drives out the silly annoying unclean spirits. He has imparted His voice to US through His Holy Spirit at Pentecost and so now we have that same authority to command those silly voices to be quiet (in the Name of Jesus). Today we see that head knowledge is important and the teachings of Christ are astonishing, but the living it out is what drives away the darkness. So let’s clear our voices with the authority that Jesus gives us and let’s start speaking to those thoughts that constantly mess with us. This sounds like encouragement, kind words, saying no to lies, speaking Scripture when human words don’t measure up, declaring who you are in Christ, loving the unlovable, and praising God in the middle of the storm. When we start living this, people will be amazed and ask, “What is this? A new teaching with authority.” It is well with my soul. 

Reading 1 1 SM 1:9-20

Hannah rose after a meal at Shiloh,
and presented herself before the LORD;
at the time, Eli the priest was sitting on a chair
near the doorpost of the LORD’s temple.
In her bitterness she prayed to the LORD, weeping copiously,
and she made a vow, promising: “O LORD of hosts,
if you look with pity on the misery of your handmaid,
if you remember me and do not forget me,
if you give your handmaid a male child,
I will give him to the LORD for as long as he lives;
neither wine nor liquor shall he drink,
and no razor shall ever touch his head.”
As she remained long at prayer before the LORD,
Eli watched her mouth, for Hannah was praying silently;
though her lips were moving, her voice could not be heard.
Eli, thinking her drunk, said to her,
“How long will you make a drunken show of yourself?
Sober up from your wine!”
“It isn’t that, my lord,” Hannah answered.
“I am an unhappy woman.
I have had neither wine nor liquor;
I was only pouring out my troubles to the LORD.
Do not think your handmaid a ne’er-do-well;
my prayer has been prompted by my deep sorrow and misery.”
Eli said, “Go in peace,
and may the God of Israel grant you what you have asked of him.”
She replied, “Think kindly of your maidservant,” and left.
She went to her quarters, ate and drank with her husband,
and no longer appeared downcast.
Early the next morning they worshiped before the LORD,
and then returned to their home in Ramah.

When Elkanah had relations with his wife Hannah,
the LORD remembered her.
She conceived, and at the end of her term bore a son
whom she called Samuel, since she had asked the LORD for him.

Responsorial Psalm 1 SAMUEL 2:1, 4-5, 6-7, 8ABCD

R.    (see 1) My heart exults in the Lord, my Savior.
“My heart exults in the LORD,
my horn is exalted in my God.
I have swallowed up my enemies;
I rejoice in my victory.”
R.    My heart exults in the Lord, my Savior.
“The bows of the mighty are broken,
while the tottering gird on strength.
The well-fed hire themselves out for bread,
while the hungry batten on spoil.
The barren wife bears seven sons,
while the mother of many languishes.”
R.    My heart exults in the Lord, my Savior.
“The LORD puts to death and gives life;
he casts down to the nether world;
he raises up again.
The LORD makes poor and makes rich;
he humbles, he also exalts.”
R.    My heart exults in the Lord, my Savior.
“He raises the needy from the dust;
from the dung heap he lifts up the poor,
To seat them with nobles
and make a glorious throne their heritage.”
R.    My heart exults in the Lord, my Savior.

Alleluia 1 THES 2:13

R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Receive the word of God, not as the word of men,
but as it truly is, the word of God.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel MK 1:21-28

Jesus came to Capernaum with his followers,
and on the sabbath he entered the synagogue and taught.
The people were astonished at his teaching,
for he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes.
In their synagogue was a man with an unclean spirit;
he cried out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?
Have you come to destroy us?
I know who you are–the Holy One of God!”
Jesus rebuked him and said, “Quiet!  Come out of him!”
The unclean spirit convulsed him and with a loud cry came out of him.
 
All were amazed and asked one another,
 “What is this?
A new teaching with authority.
He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him.”
His fame spread everywhere throughout the whole region of Galilee.

I Will Make You…

“This is the time of fulfillment.” It occurred to me to today that the minute Jesus steps onto the scene, or into our hearts, or dive-bombs our lives with an encounter, or we simply look up and notice Him there, is “the time of fulfillment.” His presence is fulfillment. Carrying His presence, living in His presence, following His presence, and being His presence is fulfillment (other words for fulfillment: self-actualization, joy, inner peace, realization) of the Kingdom at hand. So where did Jesus begin? In the ordinary daily living of regular people doing their thing. He noticed them casting their nets. He notices us doing life and He calls to us, “Come after me, and I will make you…” What is Jesus calling you into this morning? What does He see you living that He can turn into mission, purpose, and fulfillment? Jen, come after me, and I will make you a serenade to my beloveds that don’t remember. Jen, come after me, and I will make you compassion for the lonely. Jen, come after me, and I will make you a server for my sweethearts. What will Jesus notice in you, that He can use for the Kingdom at hand? It is well with my soul. 

Reading 1 1 SM 1:1-8

There was a certain man from Ramathaim, Elkanah by name,
a Zuphite from the hill country of Ephraim.
He was the son of Jeroham, son of Elihu,
son of Tohu, son of Zuph, an Ephraimite.
He had two wives, one named Hannah, the other Peninnah;
Peninnah had children, but Hannah was childless.
This man regularly went on pilgrimage from his city
to worship the LORD of hosts and to sacrifice to him at Shiloh,
where the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas,
were ministering as priests of the LORD.
When the day came for Elkanah to offer sacrifice,
he used to give a portion each to his wife Peninnah
and to all her sons and daughters,
but a double portion to Hannah because he loved her,
though the LORD had made her barren.
Her rival, to upset her, turned it into a constant reproach to her
that the LORD had left her barren.
This went on year after year;
each time they made their pilgrimage to the sanctuary of the LORD,
Peninnah would approach her,
and Hannah would weep and refuse to eat.
Her husband Elkanah used to ask her:
“Hannah, why do you weep, and why do you refuse to eat?
Why do you grieve?
Am I not more to you than ten sons?”

Responsorial PSALM 116:12-13, 14-17, 18-19

R.    (17a)  To you, Lord, I will offer a sacrifice of praise.
or:
R.    Alleluia.
How shall I make a return to the LORD
 for all the good he has done for me?
The cup of salvation I will take up,
 and I will call upon the name of the LORD.
R.    To you, Lord, I will offer a sacrifice of praise.
or:
R.    Alleluia.
My vows to the LORD I will pay
 in the presence of all his people.
Precious in the eyes of the LORD
is the death of his faithful ones.
O LORD, I am your servant;
I am your servant, the son of your handmaid;
you have loosed my bonds.
R.    To you, Lord, I will offer a sacrifice of praise.
or:
R.    Alleluia.
My vows to the LORD I will pay
in the presence of all his people,
In the courts of the house of the LORD,
in your midst, O Jerusalem.
R.    To you, Lord, I will offer a sacrifice of praise.
or:
R.    Alleluia.

Alleluia MK 1:15

R. Alleluia, alleluia.
The Kingdom of God is at hand;
repent and believe in the Gospel.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel MK 1:14-20

After John had been arrested,
Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the Gospel of God:
“This is the time of fulfillment.
The Kingdom of God is at hand.
Repent, and believe in the Gospel.”

As he passed by the Sea of Galilee,
he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting their nets into the sea;
     they were fishermen.
Jesus said to them,
“Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
Then they left their nets and followed him.
He walked along a little farther
and saw James, the son of Zebedee, and his brother John.
They too were in a boat mending their nets.
Then he called them.
So they left their father Zebedee in the boat
along with the hired men and followed him.

Be Clean

I usually only write on the gospel, but the first reading really tugged at me today. The opening line is, “Who indeed is the victor over the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” I don’t know about you, but I like being on the winning team and according to John, who knew Jesus more intimately than most, all I need to do is believe that He is the Son of God. OK, so what’s the problem? I got this. Or do I? What about my need to control situations that are beyond my control? What about my doubt that God can still love me even when I sin? What about my inability to surrender the fight and give it over to Him? What about my fear? What about my woundedness? What about my pride? What about my insecurity? And that list goes on and on. I’m not sure any one of those things convicts my heart that Jesus is the Son of God. I know, I know, I should cut myself some slack, I’m only human and these are all very real issues of our humanity, but I certainly cannot settle in complacency, I should not let these things identify me, I don’t have to choose to live in the mediocrity of humanity, I can do better, I am called to holiness and holiness means that I need to become the best version of myself, the version that God has been painting, composing, sculpting, and writing my whole life. Why would I want to be anything less than? To believe that Jesus is the Son of God requires holiness. Holiness requires purification. Purification requires presenting our unclean selves to Jesus and allowing Him to wash us in water and in blood. These symbols come directly from the Hebrew sacrificial offering liturgy of the Old Testament before Christ came onto the scene. John points out that when Jesus was born He came into the world through blood and water and we know that it was John who witnessed Jesus’ side being pierced on the cross and blood and water gushed forth as a sign that our sin had been purified (divine mercy!!). It wasn’t until the Holy Spirit came upon the apostles that these mysteries could be discovered and the same is true for us, we must surrender to the Holy Spirit in order to see the workings of Jesus in the world. Spirit (grace), water (cleansing), and blood (death to self) are necessary for us to be able to proclaim Jesus as the Son of God and that means we need to come before God unclean so that we can be purified. 

Today’s gospel is about a leper that went to Jesus for healing. It says that he fell face down on the ground and begged Him, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” If? Do you know that Jesus healed 100% of the people that came to Him for healing? There is no “if” in that statistic! We actually don’t need to “beg” Him for healing at all because He says, “I am willing. Be clean.” Coming with humility the way the leper does in today’s gospel is significant, but expecting to be healed is also paramount. The saying “beggars can’t be choosers” does not apply to asking Jesus for healing. So insert whatever form of leprosy you have, mine are all in the list of questions posed in my opening paragraph, feel Jesus’ touch and hear His words, “I am willing. Be clean.” Notice the “I Am” of that sentence and understand that in the ancient Jewish society it was believed that only God can heal leprosy and Jesus was saying “I Am.” Only God can fill the voids in our lives that leave us unclean, far away from love, feeling unworthy, unloved, and Jesus says, “I Am.”

The final piece of the gospel is when Jesus tells the leper, don’t tell anyone about this, but show them that your life has been changed. They knew he was a leper before and they would see with their own eyes that he is no longer that, and they would know that only God could have made that happen. Even though I am a words person, sometimes words do fall short and we just need to show people how God is working in our life through the fruits of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and forgiveness. We cannot control how others perceive or receive us, but we can control how we show God’s presence in our life. 

From that encounter, “The report about him spread all the more, and great crowds assembled to listen to him and to be cured of their ailments, but he would withdraw to deserted places to pray.” Jesus needed to withdraw, rest, and pray, and he gives you and I permission to do the same. 

Let’s bring our uncleanliness before Jesus so that he can wash us in mercy and grace. Let’s show the world that God is indeed working in our life by treating them with loveliness. Let’s take some time in a lonely place to pray. It is well with my soul. 

Reading 1 1 JN 5:5-13

Beloved:
Who indeed is the victor over the world
but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

This is the one who came through water and Blood, Jesus Christ,
not by water alone, but by water and Blood.
The Spirit is the one who testifies,
and the Spirit is truth.
So there are three who testify,
the Spirit, the water, and the Blood,
and the three are of one accord.
If we accept human testimony,
the testimony of God is surely greater.
Now the testimony of God is this,
that he has testified on behalf of his Son.
Whoever believes in the Son of God
has this testimony within himself.
Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar
by not believing the testimony God has given about his Son.
And this is the testimony:
God gave us eternal life,
and this life is in his Son.
Whoever possesses the Son has life;
whoever does not possess the Son of God does not have life.

I write these things to you so that you may know
that you have eternal life,
you who believe in the name of the Son of God.

Responsorial Psalm 147:12-13, 14-15, 19-20

R.    (12a)  Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
or:
R.    Alleluia.
Glorify the LORD, O Jerusalem;
praise your God, O Zion.
For he has strengthened the bars of your gates;
he has blessed your children within you.
R.    Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
or:
R.    Alleluia.
He has granted peace in your borders;
with the best of wheat he fills you.
He sends forth his command to the earth;
swiftly runs his word!
R.    Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
or:
R.    Alleluia.
He has proclaimed his word to Jacob,
his statutes and his ordinances to Israel.
He has not done thus for any other nation;
his ordinances he has not made known to them. Alleluia.
R.    Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
or:
R.    Alleluia.

Alleluia MT 4:23

R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Jesus proclaimed the Gospel of the Kingdom
and cured every disease among the people.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel LK 5:12-16

It happened that there was a man full of leprosy in one of the towns where Jesus was;
and when he saw Jesus,
he fell prostrate, pleaded with him, and said,
“Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean.”
Jesus stretched out his hand, touched him, and said,
“I do will it.  Be made clean.”
And the leprosy left him immediately.
Then he ordered him not to tell anyone, but
“Go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing
what Moses prescribed; that will be proof for them.”
The report about him spread all the more,
and great crowds assembled to listen to him
and to be cured of their ailments,
but he would withdraw to deserted places to pray.

Holy Hunger

I’m sure we have each encountered the quintessential character of the doting Grandma that feels the need to feed everyone that comes across her threshold with copious amounts of homemade food because her heart is pierced by people’s hunger. This captures Jesus in today’s gospel. He is moved by the hunger of His people, and guess what? He is still moved by our hunger. He saw the crowd as sheep without a shepherd indicating something called Holy Hunger. Holy Hunger is a longing for more, a desire to go deeper, dissatisfaction with this world, a journeying toward beauty, a search for treasure, a deep stirring for meaning, a reaching toward the light, and a trying to make sense of it all. He saw the vast crowd and he saw their vast hunger and the vastness moved His heart. Another word for vastness is immensity and I believe that Jesus honed in on the immensity of people’s need to know, to see, and to believe that God loves them. This is the main thing and Jesus could not not feed them because He loves them so much. Today He sees you, He sees me, and He sees our vast hunger for more, and He cannot not feed us. So let your Holy Hunger burn for more and Jesus’ heart will be moved to give you more. It is our part to receive and to be consumed by this Bread of Life. It is well with my soul. 

Reading 1 1 JN 4:7-10

Beloved, let us love one another,
because love is of God;
everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God.
Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love.
In this way the love of God was revealed to us:
God sent his only-begotten Son into the world
so that we might have life through him.
In this is love:
not that we have loved God, but that he loved us
and sent his Son as expiation for our sins.

Responsorial Psalm PS 72:1-2, 3-4, 7-8

R. (see 11)  Lord, every nation on earth will adore you.
O God, with your judgment endow the king,
and with your justice, the king’s son;
He shall govern your people with justice
and your afflicted ones with judgment.
R. Lord, every nation on earth will adore you.
The mountains shall yield peace for the people,
and the hills justice.
He shall defend the afflicted among the people,
save the children of the poor.
R. Lord, every nation on earth will adore you.
Justice shall flower in his days,
and profound peace, till the moon be no more.
May he rule from sea to sea,
and from the River to the ends of the earth.
R. Lord, every nation on earth will adore you.

Alleluia LK 4:18 

R. Alleluia, alleluia.
The Lord has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor
and to proclaim liberty to captives.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel MK 6:34-44 

When Jesus saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them,
for they were like sheep without a shepherd;
and he began to teach them many things.
By now it was already late and his disciples approached him and said,
“This is a deserted place and it is already very late.
Dismiss them so that they can go
to the surrounding farms and villages
and buy themselves something to eat.”
He said to them in reply,
“Give them some food yourselves.”
But they said to him,
“Are we to buy two hundred days’ wages worth of food
and give it to them to eat?”
He asked them, “How many loaves do you have?  Go and see.”
And when they had found out they said,
“Five loaves and two fish.”
So he gave orders to have them sit down in groups on the green grass.
The people took their places in rows by hundreds and by fifties.
Then, taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven,
he said the blessing, broke the loaves, and gave them to his disciples
to set before the people;
he also divided the two fish among them all.
They all ate and were satisfied.
And they picked up twelve wicker baskets full of fragments
and what was left of the fish.
Those who ate of the loaves were five thousand men.

The Kingdom Of Heaven Is At Hand

Today, Jesus shows us the Way we are to spread the Kingdom. The death of John the Baptist was a springboard for Jesus to get into the heart of His own mission on earth. It seems that moving to a new setting was significant for many reasons including the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy, but also there is something in stepping out and away from the familiar that activates a person’s call in a special way. There are so many stories of great missionaries, preachers, Saints, and world changers that were called out of their familiar into foreign countries, or the slums, or leper colonies, or across the world, or into conditions and territories that were unfamiliar, unfriendly, or simply “not home”. When God moves us somewhere, He gives us strength for the journey and an extra portion of our unique gifts to be able to impact our new environment. Jesus moved to “Galilee of the Gentiles” and the prophecy was that “the people who sit in darkness have seen a great light, on those dwelling in a land overshadowed by death light has arisen.” 

Jesus gives us our first marching orders by quoting His beloved John, “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Repent simply means change your way of thinking and wrap it around the reality that heaven is here in the Person of Jesus. Then He shows us what Kingdom thinking and living looks like, “He went around all of Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the Gospel of the Kingdom, and curing every disease and illness among the people.” Teaching in the synagogues is Jesus leading with the Word of God, and speaking it into the atmosphere. From there, He proclaims the Gospel of the Kingdom, which is to love God and others as yourself. The Word leads to Love, and this Love, steeped in the Word, leads to curing EVERY disease and illness among the people!!!! 1. Change your thoughts and focus them on Jesus, 2. Speak The Word into your environments, 3. Proclaim the Gospel of Love, and 4. Cure EVERY disease and illness…this is our commissioning as well and as sons and daughters of God we have the power to do all of the above because the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead lives in us. It all begins in our mindset. 

Just like the death of John the Baptist launched Jesus into His ministry, so does the death and resurrection of Christ launch us.  We have all that we need through the Holy Spirit to do as Jesus did, to love as Jesus loves, to heal as Jesus heals, and to teach as Jesus teaches. “His fame spreads” in and through us when we change our minds to be like His. We are called to be “the great light” to the “people who sit in darkness.” Jesus came to show us how to live. Today’s gospel renews my own call and encourages me to mind my mind because the miraculous begins there. “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand.” It is well with my soul.

Reading 1 1 JN 3:22–4:6

Beloved:
We receive from him whatever we ask,
because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him.
And his commandment is this:
we should believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ,
and love one another just as he commanded us.
Those who keep his commandments remain in him, and he in them,
and the way we know that he remains in us
is from the Spirit whom he gave us.

Beloved, do not trust every spirit
but test the spirits to see whether they belong to God,
because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
This is how you can know the Spirit of God:
every spirit that acknowledges Jesus Christ come in the flesh
belongs to God,
and every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus
does not belong to God.
This is the spirit of the antichrist
who, as you heard, is to come,
but in fact is already in the world.
You belong to God, children, and you have conquered them,
for the one who is in you
is greater than the one who is in the world.
They belong to the world;
accordingly, their teaching belongs to the world,
and the world listens to them.
We belong to God, and anyone who knows God listens to us,
while anyone who does not belong to God refuses to hear us.
This is how we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of deceit.

Responsorial Psalm PS 2:7BC-8, 10-12A 

R. (8ab)  I will give you all the nations for an inheritance.
The LORD said to me, “you are my Son;
this day I have begotten you.
Ask of me and I will give you
the nations for an inheritance
and the ends of the earth for your possession.”
R. I will give you all the nations for an inheritance.
And now, O kings, give heed;
take warning, you rulers of the earth.
Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice before him;
with trembling rejoice.
R. I will give you all the nations for an inheritance.

Alleluia MT 4:23 

R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Jesus proclaimed the Gospel of the Kingdom
and cured every disease among the people.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel MT 4:12-17, 23-25

When Jesus heard that John had been arrested,
he withdrew to Galilee. 
He left Nazareth and went to live in Capernaum by the sea,
in the region of Zebulun and Naphtali,
that what had been said through Isaiah the prophet 
might be fulfilled:
 

Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali,
the way to the sea, beyond the Jordan,
Galilee of the Gentiles,
the people who sit in darkness
have seen a great light,
on those dwelling in a land overshadowed by death
light has arisen.
From that time on, Jesus began to preach and say,
“Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
 

He went around all of Galilee,
teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the Gospel of the Kingdom,
and curing every disease and illness among the people. 
His fame spread to all of Syria,
and they brought to him all who were sick with various diseases
and racked with pain,
those who were possessed, lunatics, and paralytics,
and he cured them. 
And great crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, and Judea,
and from beyond the Jordan followed him.