THE WORD
Job 38,1.12-21; 40,3-5 / Lk 10,13-16
Jesus said to his disciples, “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have repented, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you. And as for you, Capernaum, ‘Will you be exalted to heaven?
You will go down to the netherworld.’ Whoever listens to you listens to me. Whoever rejects you rejects me. And whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me.”
IN OTHER WORDS
‘Pride is the last vice to leave those returning to God, and the first to greet those leaving God behind.’ Someone has put it well: Although you are fighting well and think you have uprooted everything, pride still threatens to re-contaminate you and must therefore be conquered.
In today’s gospel, Jesus speaks against certain towns: Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum, Unlike Tyre and Sidon, they are populated mostly by Jews. They are proud to mend their ways and refuse to listen to God. Typically, Jews think that by being God’s chosen people, they deserve every miracle that God performs. They think that God showers favors and blessings only on circumcised
Jews, though he may sometimes make exceptions for pagans. ‘Listen to the word and put it into practice’ is probably what God wants from all of us. Job in the first reading has learned this lesson well. God’s answer to Job is this: Man has gradually to learn that he does not know all the mysteries of God’s universe and allow God to be God. Let God speak to us and we have to listen and obey his words.
St. Jerome made an eff ort to allow the word of God to be more relevant to us when he translated the scripture into a language that others could understand at that time. His famous words echo throughout the years, “To be ignorant of the scripture is not to know Christ.”
Let us ponder upon the moments when we rejected the word of God. Recall the moments when we most welcomed it. How do we respond to rejection?
- Fr. Renato Yadao, SVD | Papua New Guinea
The Word in other words 2016
An annual project of Logos Publications, The WORD in Other Words Bible Diary contains daily scripture readings and reflections written by priest, brothers, and sisters of the three congregations founded by St. Arnold Janssen (the SVD, SSpS, and SSpSAP). It hopes to serve as a daily companion to readers who continually seek the correlation of the Word of God and human experience.
