Well, here we are again in the Ordinary time of our Liturgical Calendar. This doesn’t mean that it is just, “Ho-Hum”, ordinary because it’s not the Advent or Lenten or Easter season, but that we are in the “Order” of Our Lord’s teachings for us; actually, a very important time.

Jesus is teaching us about the “power” that God is relaying to us through His love, mercy and kindness that He wants us, through the free will that He enjoined on us, to return to Him. Yes, that’s power. Not the power that any dictator or tyrant throughout time has wielded, as that is a false power, rooted in fear through cruelty. At the heart of every bully is a coward, which is the absence of these virtues.

When we acknowledge what God is giving us, and accepting His will for us by our own choice, we receive this power. But that’s the catch, it isn’t just bestowed on us like the Queen knighting us, it is “Thy will be done” but also our will being done in response to Him. Confusing, not really. It’s like St. Francis of Assisi asked as to whether, “it’s about God who gives us this grace or we who are to receive it?” Well, of course it’s both. Again, it’s not just a matter of saying, “thank You Father for this divine gift,” He is expecting us to actively respond back to Him.

So, how do we do this? Well, first through prayer. St Paul tells us that we must learn to pray because, “we do not know how to pray as we ought.” God gives us the answer by teaching us that He is three divine persons. We pray to Him the Father, and He gives us Himself in His Son, the teacher of the faith, the head of His Church and He gives us Himself in the Holy Spirit to be with us and guide us in prayer. So, we know many prayers that we pray to the Father and through the Holy Spirit to intercede for us to the Father. We even have the Blessed Mother and the Saints to pray with for our sake in faith, and that’s a great start. But that also leads us to Our Lord’s teaching and once again it is in His favorite form of the parables. Jesus adds the next important step in prayer, beyond the words and intent, and that is through action.

In our Gospel reading from Matthew, we receive some of the teaching that Our Lord imparts on us, and as usual the disciples are confused and need clarification. So, Jesus tells them that the Father sows the good seed, and that we are that seed. In other words, God gives us what we need to grow which is by His will, the water and the sun. We then need to respond by growing, accepting faith by our will and getting stronger in that faith. “Then the righteous (you and me) will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father.

He then teaches us that we may feel small and insignificant, like the smallest of seeds. But, by accepting and reacting to His faith by our choice, we receive that divine power in love, mercy and kindness and grow exponentially in faith. Truly it is not us alone Jesus is saying, but that the Father again is with us through His Son and the Holy Spirit to guide us in our faith to become stronger by His power in us.

And perhaps the teaching of Our Lord’s message to us is therefore also in the value of our response, to recognize the strength of our growth in the action of our faith, the example that we live in our faith for others to see. Certainly, it is by our actions in ministry to and for others that we are strengthened and grow in our faith.

We are not to just be spectators but to take action as the visible aspect of our prayers which lends ourselves to the growth of His Church, (the large, growing mustard plant), whether we realize it or not.

In reality, I see it in so many of you and together we see that growth happening around us today, the new faces that we see at Mass, young people and their families who are looking for something greater, something real to believe in, to cling to in faith. This is not by chance, but by action and example and it’s happening in the vast majority of our churches. 

Choice by our response to prayer; the action of our faith that it leads us to, which is the gift of His divine power to us in the first place. Pretty Awesome don’t you think?

May God continue to bless us,

Dcn Joe (emeritus)