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From the Pastor's Desk: January 24, 2021
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The message of the Gospel of Mark that we focus on this year, wants people to understand the continuity between the end of John the Baptist’s ministry and the beginning of Jesus’ ministry. At the very beginning of His public ministry, Jesus reveals the nature of His mission as a call to all who wants to follow Him – “to repent and believe in the Good News, for the time of fulfillment is at hand.” The call and the mission of Jesus is not time-bound, but rather it is an ongoing invitation to each and every one of us as once generously received and responded by Simon, Andrew, James and John. Today we are Jesus’ disciples who need to respond with generosity of our own hearts to the call of God in our lives, so we can pronounce and show in words and deeds that Jesus Christ is indeed the Good News and the time of fulfillment is very much at hand.
The message today may seem to be a very simple invitation, where in fact it is very rich in meaning. One can say that the whole of the Gospel message is contained in those two sentences:
Repent…Here we have the basic steps needed to become fully a Kingdom person. First, we need to repent - metanoia (metanoia) is the most common translation of the Greek verb of the word. ‘Repent’ for most people means being sorry for something done in the past. That is only partially correct, because metanoia looks much more to the future. Metanoia really means a radical change in one’s thinking and reaches to the meaning and purpose of life and how that life is to be lived. Jesus is calling here for a radical conversion and to take on His vision of life.
…and believe in the Gospel… By believing in the Gospel, metanoia is experienced and achieved. For many Christians, belief means the total acceptance of the teachings of Christ as interpreted for us by the Church. But something more is asked of us. We are asked not just to believe but to believe IN. It is one thing to believe something as true but it may not affect our lives very much. But in calling on us to believe IN the message that the Gospel brings, we are being asked for a total investment of ourselves and not just in accepting doctrines as true. We are being called on to live our lives and pattern them on the model of Jesus Himself and His two commands: repent and believe.
The amazing truth about Christianity is that it is God who seeks and takes the initial action to invite us into a relationship with Him. It always starts with God, not with us! This is clear in the Gospel - Mark shows Jesus doing what He came to earth to do: calling people into a personal relationship with God. This is really the core of what Christianity is all about. He calls His first Apostles by name - Peter, Andrew, James, John. He calls them, because He wants to give them more meaning, purpose, and, ultimately, happiness. He even does not expect much of them, does not ask any questions, no string and preconditions attached – just simply follow Him the way you are, whatever you are, however messy your life may be. All He wants is to lead you to love Him through conversion of your heart and faith in His message as to bring everyone into His Kingdom. For that matter, the idea of the Prayer Process is so important because it allows us to spend time with Him, to reflect with gratitude upon our lives, to bring awareness into our lives, to capture the daily “holy moments”, and to seek peace through forgiveness as to experience freedom from sin and to become “the-best-version-of-ourselves”, to remember and lift others in prayer in the words that the Master thought us.
As we continue on our journey of faith, let us pray this week that the transforming power of the message of the Gospel will become the source of hope for us. May our authentic discipleship bring others to the truth of the Good News that quenches their thirst for happiness, peace, and personal growth. This is the message of the Gospel, a message we are privileged to know, believe, and proclaim.
Have a blessed day!
With prayers,
Fr. Andy
