Today's Old Testament Lesson is from the 1st Book of Samuel, beginning
at the 3rd Chapter, and the 3rd Verse:
Samuel was lying down within the temple of the LORD, where the ark of God was. Then the LORD called, "Samuel! Samuel!" and he said, "Here I am!" and ran to Eli, and said, "Here I am, for you called me." But he said, "I did not call; lie down again." So he went and lay down. And the LORD called again, "Samuel!" And Samuel arose and went to Eli, and said, "Here I am, for you called me." But he said, "I did not call, my son; lie down again."
Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, and the word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him. And the LORD called Samuel again the third time. And he arose and went to Eli, and said, "Here I am, for you called me." Then Eli perceived that the LORD was calling the boy.
Therefore Eli said to Samuel, "Go, lie down; and if he calls you, you shall say, 'Speak, LORD, for thy servant hears.'" So Samuel went and lay down in his place. And the LORD came and stood forth, calling as at other times, "Samuel! Samuel!" And Samuel said, "Speak, for thy servant hears."
And Samuel grew, and the LORD was with him and let none of his
words fall to the ground.
Today's Epistle is from the Letter of Paul
to the Corinthians, beginning at the 6th Chapter, and the 13th Verse:
The body is not meant for immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I therefore take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never!
But he who is united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Shun
immorality. Every other sin which a man commits is outside the body;
but the immoral man sins against his own body. Do you not know that
your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have
from God? You are not your own; you were bought with a price. So
glorify God in your body.
+ A Reading from the Gospel of John,
Beginning at the 1st Chapter, and the 35th Verse:
The next day again John the Baptist was standing with two of his disciples; and he looked at Jesus as he walked, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God!" The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus.
Jesus turned, and saw them following, and said to them, "What do you seek?" And they said to him, "Rabbi" (which means Teacher), where are you staying?" He said to them, "Come and see." They came and saw where he was staying; and they stayed with him that day, for it was about the tenth hour.
One of the two who heard John speak, and followed him, was Andrew,
Simon Peter's brother. He first found his brother Simon, and said to
him, "We have found the Messiah" (which means Christ). He brought him
to Jesus. Jesus looked at him, and said, "So you are Simon the son of
John? You shall be called Cephas" (which means Peter). ?
Last Sunday's Gospel talked about the beginning of Jesus' ministry -- His baptism in the Jordan River by his cousin John. This week's Gospel continues the story, telling how He selected his first Apostles -- including Peter.
Today's Old Testament Lesson recounts how the Prophet Samuel (I love that name), as a young boy, was called to service in the Temple by the voice of the Lord. He responded, as did the Apostles much later, with some confusion at first, and then enthusiasm.
We are all called to the Lord's service -- some of us he talks to, some of us just find ourselves in the middle of doing His work. Not all who are called continue the work -- some fall by the wayside.
Some fall out due to laziness -- they just can't seem to work up the energy to do the Lord's work; some get distracted by other things -- people, places, things, possessions; others by their own passions and weaknesses.
In today's Epistle, St. Paul talks about the body being "the Lord's" (i.e. Christ's), being a member of Christ, and being the Temple of the Holy Spirit. He exhorts us to glorify God in our bodies, and to stay away from immorality.
Nowadays, when someone says "immoral", we immediately think of sexual immorality. Sex has been so oversold, by Hollywood, Madison Avenue, and undereducated preachers, that people have come to think that the only morality is sexual.
While it is true that Paul is warning about sexual immorality in this letter, there are many other kinds of immoralities that we need to worry about. Each and every one of these causes us to fall by the wayside, to lose our way, to fall short of the Lord's call to us.
Lust (Sexual Immorality) is just one of the Seven Deadly Sins -- the others are Pride, Anger, Envy, Sloth, Covetousness, and Gluttony. Each of them is an immorality, and each of them leads/drives us away from God.
In our day, Anger is perhaps the most visible sin -- anger at others, and the reckless violence that it engenders. We are overwhelmed with messages of anger from the media and "entertainment" -- people scream at each other on TV shows, movies are full of violence and blood spraying all over, computer games portray other people as objects to be blasted with various weapons.
Music advocates rape and murder; casual jokes about "dead babies" are common; obscene tortures are common in late-term abortions -- and nobody seems to care. We make jokes about "going Postal", "road rage", and other atrocities.
Society is casually brutal -- muggers beating victims, police beating suspects, Federal agents shooting and burning women and children. It all gets excused, it all gets ignored. Nowadays, it is OK to be angry and take it out on your neighbor.
This is not the Lord's work, people -- His command is to "...Love thy neighbor as thyself." Maybe the reason that so many people can't seem to love their neighbors is that they can't love themselves.
There is an emotional brutality in our world, too -- casual insults and put-downs. The message that everyone gets is that "you're no good". Some of this comes from people's insecurity -- the only way they can feel up is if they put someone else down.
Some of this comes from sectarian preaching -- total depravity and things like that -- which pick up on the old, old Manichean and Albigensian ideas that the body, and the material world, are by nature evil. This teaching, this sadistic distortion, is not Christian -- it is Zoroastrian and Gnostic. It is foreign to the message that Jesus taught us about His loving Father.
St. John says: "God so loved the World, that He sent His Only-Begotten Son..." And that Son preached love above all things -- He commanded us to love God, and love our neighbor. He gave us permission to love ourselves -- no selfish love of self, but true love -- each and every one of us is a Temple of the Holy Spirit, and our bodies are "...members of Christ..." as St. Paul reminds us in today's Epistle.
The whole world was made by God's loving hands, and He wills that it should return, in love, to Him -- not in fear and trepidation. The "evil of the flesh" that St. Paul talks about in his Epistles is the deliberate separation from God, the turning toward Pride, Anger, List, Envy, Sloth, Greed, and Gluttony, instead of towards Love of Him.
Being all members of Christ -- each of us is part of His mystical Body -- we are able to experience and benefit from the torrents of Grace and Blessing that flow out from the Father, through Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit. We can open ourselves, and be transformed by the miracle of God's love, can be miraculously cured of our ills and fears.
It is at once the easiest and most difficult thing in the world -- simply let go of our pride, our greed, our lusts -- our attachments to things which are not God. It is the most difficult thing in the world to empty ourselves of ourselves, to let go all the small hurts, jealousies, angers and pouting that we have built up all our lives.
It is difficult to let go of thinking of ourselves as unworthy, evil, no good. It is so hard to remember that we are all children of a loving God, of a God who calls us back to Himself by every means and every thing. He is in all, and everywhere -- cleave wood, and He is there, lift a stone, and He is there.
See the Lord in others, see the Lord in yourself -- this is what Jesus means when He says: "Let your light so shine before men..." We are called in this life to manifest -- show forth -- God's glory in our lives, and we do this by loving. So simple and so difficult.
In the Jubilee Year, we are commanded to forgive debts, to be reconciled with our neighbor, and to praise the Lord. Let us, then, open up the gates of our hearts -- to God and our fellow creatures -- and truly celebrate the Jubilee!
In the Name of The Father + And of the Son And of the Holy Spirit Amen.