SATURDAY OF THE 1ST WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME
- Dn. Boniface Mburu Kimani
- Jan 15, 2022
- 3 min read
15TH JANUARY 2022
FOLLOWING THE LORD
The Gospel of today shows us the fundamental characteristic of Jesus’ call. The Gospel of Mark is characterized by the call, life and formation of the disciples. This shows already that Jesus’ mission is not exclusive. It is very much inclusive.
All are called and invited to participate in his Missionary Work for the salvation of the world and for the building of the Kingdom of God. No one is left behind and no one can claim to be the only one and best disciple of Jesus. This is the characteristic of the Mission and work of Evangelization of the church today.
In the Gospel of today, Jesus was at work. He was preaching and teaching to the crowds who followed Him everywhere and were very much interested in his teaching and way of life. While he was doing his teaching, He realized the vastness of his work. And as He was walking to other destination for his mission, He saw Levi, Matthew, the tax Collector, doing his job. He called Him and asked him to follow his footsteps, “follow me”. Immediately, without hesitation, Matthew left everything and followed Jesus.
This is a very rich and beautiful story about life with Christ. Therefore what lesson can we learn from this Gospel of today?
First of all, we see Jesus’ generosity to share his mission to human being. This is God’s characteristic and God’s ways of working for our salvation. He always includes humanity to the fulfillment of his Salvific plan for the whole creature.
God always needs and wants to collaborate with humanity, his creatures, to bring and fulfill his plan for salvation that He had from the beginning. We can see that in the Old Testament, God always chooses some people to be involved in his salvific works. He chose prophets to be his instrument to bring and prepare people to the Salvation. He chose them no because they were worthy nor they were superhuman beings, He chose them just because He wanted and loved them.
This God’s initiative to call for collaboration reached its highest through the Virgin Mary and the Incarnation of His Son. God chose Mary to be the Mother of His Son to express and extend his openness to the collaboration of bringing the Messiah to the whole humanity. God could come down and become one of us in a miraculous way, because He is God, All Powerful; but he did not do that because He needs to involve his creature in His Mighty work.
We know that Jesus, the Messiah, the Savior is both and fully God and truly man. And Jesus saved us not only because He is God, He saved us because He is also Human and knows our sufferings and struggles. He saved us through His blood which is the sign and symbol of human life. This is also seen as the collaboration and Union of God and Humanity.
As Christians, the Gospel of today challenges us that God needs me and you to collaborate with Him. He involves each and every one of us in his great work of Salvation.
None of us is useless or excluded in the field of the Lord. Each has a great vacation, a great responsibility in establishing the Kingdom of God on earth. There is no discrimination in God. He loved us all and invites all to be his collaborators. Therefore, be God’s disciple and ambassador.
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