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Dear sisters and brothers in
the Lord,
Halfway into his public ministry, with thousands of people following
him, Jesus took seventy disciples aside and gave them an assignment:
“The harvest is abundant, but the laborers are few; so ask the master of
the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest. Go on your way.” (Luke
10:2-3) This appeal was not just one task among many. Drawing his
closest friends near to him, Jesus revealed to them the heart of his
mission: reconciliation with the Father. In order to catch the full
meaning of these words and respond to them with the generosity and
conviction they deserve, the disciples needed not only to hear what
Jesus was saying, they needed to feel it. Can you sense the
urgency in his voice? Can you see the love in his eyes as he gazes upon
the crowds following him? Do you feel his heart pounding with love and
his voice breaking with compassion?
In his 1990 encyclical, Mission of Christ the Redeemer, Pope John Paul
II exhorted us with words very similar to Jesus’ in both tone and scope:
“Today, as never before, the Church has the opportunity of bringing the
gospel, by witness and word, to all people and nations” (Redemptoris
Missio, 92). And in making this appeal, the pope spoke not just to
priests and religious: “No believer in Christ, no institution of the
Church can avoid this supreme duty: to proclaim Christ to all
peoples” (3).
The seventy returned from
their missionary trip overjoyed at how powerfully God worked through
them. We may not think God can do that through us. We may consider
ourselves unable to evangelize and witness to Christ. But we
should remember that Jesus doesn’t call the qualified; he qualifies the
called! It was his “appointment” of the seventy (Luke 10:1) that enabled
them to bear fruit. By virtue of your baptism and by the power of the
Holy Spirit within you, God can do and will do amazing things.
Lord Jesus, I hear you
calling me to proclaim you to others. Holy Spirit, please give me the
courage and conviction I need to witness to the gospel. Jesus, I trust
in you.”
Let's give our hearts and minds to the Lord!
Father Joe
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