Reflection for the 6th Week after Pentecost
Scriptures: Colossians 1:15-28; Luke 10:38-42
Key Verse: “There is only one thing worth being concerned about. Mary has discovered it, and it will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:42)
When I hear the idiom "actions speak louder than words", I think of wordless picture books. To strangers, each of our lives is like a wordless picture book. From looking at how we live our lives through either good or bad times, strangers more or less can assume what matters to us and what our values are.
A picture book that I particularly enjoy reading is “A Small Miracle,” published in 2011 by Peter Collington. Whenever I start “reading” the first page, I can't help but keep going. I know the story well, but enjoy looking through it over and over again, and always finish the book with a smile.
Peter Collington successfully illustrates every facial expression of an old poor lady throughout the picture book. The story goes like this with my own words. On a windy snowy day, she has no choice but to sell her accordion to survive. Unfortunately, a guy riding a bike passes by her and steals her purse. On her way to church, she meets the same robber who is on his way out of the church after stealing a bucket that is used to collect money to help those in need. She manages to take the offering bucket back from the robber. After she enters the church, she sees the nativity scene scattered on the floor. She tenderly puts the nativity scene back in place and puts the offering bucket next to it.
Due to exhaustion from malnutrition, she faints on her way back home. While she is unconscious, each figure of the nativity becomes alive, Mary and baby Jesus, Joseph, a shepherd, and three wise men. They carry the old lady back to her home, a wagon. They get her accordion back, go grocery shopping and cook for her, and decorate her space with a Christmas tree while Mary and baby Jesus stay with her and watch over her. When she wakes up, she is shocked by what she sees in her wagon. She opens the window and sees no one around. After enjoying the meal, she plays her accordion and sings a thanksgiving song to glorify God. She has guests in her house who bring the gifts of hope, comfort, and peace.
In Luke 10, Martha and Mary also got a visitor. Unlike the old lady from the picture book, both of them were aware of Jesus’ presence. Jesus told both Martha and Mary that Mary had made the better choice and that it would not be taken away from her. Did Jesus mean the content of his teachings, spending time with him, or the satisfaction of learning from him? Or did Jesus mean all the above? Without doubt, it had to do with Jesus. What was Martha doing that would have been taken from her? Her many tasks, housework?
If we read chapter 10 in Luke as a whole story, what is the big idea? Let’s see what else happened before Jesus visited the two sisters in Luke 10? Jesus told a lawyer the story of a Samaritan who prioritized a wounded life instead of going on to take care of his business. What story did he share before the one about the Samaritan? The commissioning of the seventy disciples! They were sent two by two to visit households as guests and cure the sick. Jesus told them: If being welcomed, peace remains in that household. If not, leave them.
The big idea of chapter 10 could be that guests are here to deliver God’s peace and cure the sick! The scripture keeps challenging us, doesn't it? A new understanding of home that is our God, a new understanding of our neighbors who are those in need wherever we are to show God’s mercy. And today, a new understanding of a guest who comes to make God’s peace with us and cure us as St. Paul said in Colossians 1:20.
Mary has made the better choice, being the recipient of God’s peace. The Samaritan had made the choice, attending a wounded life that needs God’s peace and healing. The seventy disciples have made a better choice to stay with those who welcome God’s peace and healing. And the old poor lady from the picture book A Small Miracle receiving God’s peace and healing made the chose of putting the nativity scene and the offering bucket back while being frail and vulnerable.
From today, we might need to expand our definition of hosts of a household or a church as the people of God. We tend to think that hosts are the givers and guests are the recipients, or that a person in a position of power and money is a giver and the rest are receivers. Each guest in our life is a God’s giving opportunity for us to experience God’s peace and healing in a new way each time.
What if we are called to listen attentively to each life speaking to us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus? We at times in our lives might be like Mary, the Samaritan, the seventy disciples, or the old poor lady who has opportunities to have the better part that Jesus would say. And as a result of being the recipients of God’s peace and healing, let our life together speak to the world like a picture book each day and each week. By doing so, God’s peace should prevail on earth as more relationships are healed through the blood of Jesus' cross. Amen.
Comentarios