FAITH OVERCOMES ALL FEARS
Indeed, faith in God overcomes all fears. Biblically, Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Indeed, by faith our ancestors received approval, Hebrews 11:1. Clearly, anyone who walks or lives by faith does not only have absolute trust in God but also has no cause to be afraid.
This is because faith assures and guarantees that God is in control of all, even the most seemingly hopeless situations of our lives and the world today.
FAITH IN ACTION
A beautiful story was once told of a farming community in Malawi which was experiencing a severe drought. So the chief of the community and all its habitants through the advice of the local Church leader decided to gather and pray for rain.
On the designated day for prayer, the desperate community gather with hope and eagerness. Still, only a little boy came to the gathering with an umbrella expecting rain to fall after the prayer.
This is faith in action, believing and acting correspondingly with one`s belief. Faith is never an intellectual knowledge alone. It is also a practical doing of putting into action the knowledge acquired.
OUR THEMES
The readings of this Sunday are all about knowing and doing something about it: faith. Or not doing something about it: fear the opposite of faith.
Today, there is a crisis in the life of faith of many Catholics and among the people of the world. These crises are sparked by different things, like the past cruelties of an unjust system, a disastrous or broken love relationship, family tensions, failed business and unrealized dreams, tragic injury, the sudden outbreak of covid-19, diseases or death of friends.
Yet, faith in God and Christ Jesus invites us not to be afraid. Even when the world is upside down in and around us.
The crises of faith are important stages of our Christian and human life. An unshakeable faith never grows and deepens with trust and confidence in God. Truly, our faith emerges profound, deeper and solid when it goes through crises.
THE TWO SIDES OF FAITH
Experiences of faith can be sporadic in nature and cannot be precisely programmed or solid all the time. There are privileged moments we feel God’s special presence and we must be grateful for that.
However, there are other times in life, that we will be confused, full of darkness and doubt, with God silent and seemingly absent. Moments of faith dryness or darkness of soul according to the mystic St. Jesus of the Cross, we need to be calmed and allow the storm to pass by.
Faith leads to action and action helps to solidify faith. However, our needs to grow in silence, and patience, slowly and steadily. Faith always and everywhere fulfils and assures the promise of God.
FIRST READING: WISDOM 18:6-9
The Wisdom of God invites us to learn from the Exodus: God will save us from all dangers as did with the Israelites during their most horrifying history as a people.
Hence, in the Book of Wisdom 18: 6-9, it is about God knowing the plight of his people in Egypt and doing something to deliver them. An invitation to faith in God’s promises and deliverance even amidst seeming hopelessness.
The first reading cites the Faith-filled preparedness of the ancient Hebrew slaves in Egypt before their mass exodus to the Promised Land. Their trusting Faith in their God’s promises gave them hope. We are told how their Faith and Hope resulted in their liberation.
SECOND READING: HEBREWS 11:1-2, 8-19
In praise of faith, and of Abraham, our father in faith. The second reading contextualized the theme of faith with Abraham as our Father and Model of faith. He lived out a deep and practical faith as an assurance and conviction of things hoped for without seeing them.
First, in his calling from his comfort zone to purge into the unknown future. Second is God’s promise of innumerable descendants amidst barrenness and exceeding the age of childbearing; and thirdly, the test to sacrifice his only son.
The author of the Book of Hebrews defines Faith as “the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen” (Heb 11:1). He tries to bolster the Faith of the Jewish Christians (the Hebrews), by appealing to the example of their ancestors, starting with Abraham, and reviewing the things they accomplished by Faith.
FAITH IS HOPE
Faith is the Christian hope that dictates all a man’s conduct. In it, he lives, possesses, and dies that, which makes him act as he does.
(i) Faith is hope, that belief in God against the world. It is the conviction of the Christian that it is better to suffer with God than to prosper with the world.
(ii) The Christian hope is belief in the spirit against the senses. The senses say to a man: “Take what you can touch and taste and handle and enjoy, while the spirit tells us that there is something far beyond that.
(iii) The Christian hope is the belief in the future against the present. The Christian is certain that in the long run, no man can exile the truth for “great is truth, and in the end, she will prevail
THE GOSPEL: LUKE 12:32-48
The Gospel of today, Luke 12:32-48 is a foreknowledge of several things that we as Catholics take on faith – that the soul lives on, that there is a kingdom of God, that a good life will be rewarded, that we must do things to prepare for our deaths – like almsgiving and love of neighbour. It also challenges us not to live by this knowledge or knowing alone but to act in faith by doing what is required of us to merit God’s promises of eternal life.
PREPAREDNESS TO MEET GOD
Besides, the theme of faith and trust in God. The gospel text of today has two senses. In its narrower sense, it refers to the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. In its wider sense, it refers to the time when God’s summons enters a man’s life, a call to prepare to meet our God.
a. There is praise for the ready servant. No man can tell the day or the hour when eternity will invade time and summons will come. How, then, would we like God to find us?
i. We would like him to find us with our work completed. Life for so many of us is filled with loose ends. There are things undone and things half done; things put off and things not even attempted. Great men have always the sense of a task that must be finished.
ii. We would like God to find us at peace with our fellowmen. It would be a haunting thing to pass from this world at bitterness with a fellow. No man should let the sun go down on his anger (Eph.4:26), least of all the last sun of all and he never knows which sun that will be.
iii. We should like God to find us at peace with ourselves. It will make all the difference in the last whether we feel that we are going out to a stranger or an enemy, or going to fall asleep in the arms of God.
ACCOUNTABILITY OF STEWARDSHIP
In the second section of this passage, Jesus draws a picture of the wise and the unwise steward. A trusted steward ran his master’s house for him and administered his estate. The unwise steward made mistakes.
(i) He said, I will do what I like while my master is away; he forgot that the day of reckoning must come.
(ii) We have a habit of dividing life into compartments. There is a part in which we remember that God is present, and there is a part in which we never think of him at all.
(iii) We tend to draw a line between sacred and secular; but if we know what Christianity means we will know that there is no part of life when the master is away. We are working and living forever in our great taskmaster’s eye.
(iv) He said, I have plenty of time to put things right before the master comes; there is nothing so fatal as to feel that we have plenty of time.
(v) One of the most dangerous days in a man’s life is when he discovers the word “tomorrow.”
The passage finishes with the warning that knowledge and privilege always bring responsibility. Sin is doubly sinful to the man who knew better; failure is doubly blameworthy in the man who had every chance to do well.
In all, faith in God and Christ Jesus makes us not give up in life and it strengthens us to be afraid of the many fearful things there are in life as we live through them.
OUR PRAYER
Lord Jesus Christ, we are being presented with many challenges of living by faith when most often life is confusing, full of darkness, and doubts with God silent and seemingly absent amidst past cruelties of an unjust system; of a disastrous love-relationship; of marriage and family tensions; and tragic injuries, sicknesses or death of friends and beloved ones.
Help us with the awareness of God’s presence guiding and helping us like Abraham our Father and Model of Faith, that faith is an ongoing process, growing as we grow, changing as we change and maturing as we mature in and through life. Amen!
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