Fulfiling Your Mission

14th Sunday Ordinary 9 AM 2007 One of the wildest of animals is the African wild boar. Yet even this fierce, ugly creature can respond to the strange experience of being loved. Dr. Schweitzer, who you know was not only a medical doctor but a missionary, adopted a savage hog whom he called Josephine. Treating the animal with much love, Schweitzer gradually saw the fierce, wild nature softening. Before long that wild pig followed the doctor on his medical and missionary visits to the sick through the African village. When the mission bell of the chapel sounded, the boar trotted along with Doctor Schweitzer to the chapel. Jesus instructs you on mission as he did his first disciples as you just heard in our gospel story this morning. But the instructions Jesus gave to his disciples must be updated. These instructions are made current through the homily… I hope. The zealous and indomitable Archbishop Hallinan of Atlanta, now deceased, in his book, written immediately after Vatican II, The Days Of Hope And Promise, said, “The context of Christ’s message and mission does not change but the manner and approach must be adapted to the needs of today.” For example, instead of carrying no money, today you might be advised to carry none of your own baggage of guilt or fear into the lives of those you are trying to help. It’s important to keep in mind that your mission of witnessing to the values of Jesus is far more then a fundamentalist parroting of bible quotations engraved on the leaves of your memory or gospel words used to fill in the blank squares in the crossword puzzle of life's problems. You fulfill your mission of witnessing to Jesus’ values by the way you live his values just as you live a healthy life by regular checkups with your doctor.. For example, when someone’s holding desperately onto the final, frail thread of hope, you can witness to Jesus’ power by your gestures of encouragement and words of affirmation. Or when a son or daughter is bound by the chains of an addiction, you can witness to Jesus’ love by keeping the door of your heart wide open and not shutting that door with the thud of a bank vault. As I said, your mission is to preach the gospel by the way you live the gospel. And it is only through practical witness that the gospel can be preached with any hope of being heard You should never give up on your mission of witnessing to Jesus because you are weak or flawed or sinful. As the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World from Vatican II reminds you, God often reveals the might of the gospel through the weakness of its witnesses. For example, just because you are impatient from time to time, doesn’t mean that you cannot teach your children patience. Bernard Bush in his book, Belonging, says, “Most of us are ordinary people doing ordinary work in an extraordinary mission.” Just as plants bear witness to the reality of roots, so the flowers of your efforts to live the Jesus’ values bear witness to the depth of your faith. Sister Clare Fitzgerald in a lecture stated with electrifying sensitivity, Faith is the visible witness to God’s unconditional loving relationship with us and at this moment of history you and I are being called to shape and form a new expression of that profound love. To be a new expression of God’s profound and unconditional love, it is essential for you to remember that in your interpersonal interactions you are to be witnesses of Jesus, not judges of one another. Ask Jesus, your indwelling friend, to help you to always fulfill your mission of giving witness to his values no matter what sacrifices you must make or what insults you must suffer. Humor: There was a barber that thought that he should share his faith with his customers more than he had been doing lately. So the next morning when the sun came up and the barber got up out of bed he said, “Today I am going to witness to the first man that walks through my door.” Soon after he opened his shop the first man came in and said, “I want a shave!” The barber said, “Sure, just sit in the seat and I’ll be with you in a moment.” The barber went in the back and prayed a quick desperate prayer saying, “God, the first customer came in and I’m going to witness to him. So please give me the wisdom to know just the right thing to say to him. Amen.” Then quickly the barber came out with his razor knife in one hand and a Bible in the other while saying, “Good morning sir. I have a question for you..........Are you ready to die?”Thought: Always fulfill your mission by witnessing to Jesus’ values.