Stir into Flame; Bear Your Share of Hardship

January 26, 2008

Memorial of Saints Timothy and Titus, bishops

…God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather of power and love and self-control. So do not be ashamed of your testimony to our Lord, nor of me, a prisoner for his sake; but bear your share of hardship for the gospel with the strength that comes from God. 2 Timothy 1:7-8

He came home. Again (the) crowd gathered, making it impossible for them even to eat. When his relatives heard of this they set out to seize him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.” Mark 3:20-21

Piety

Patient Trust

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.

We are quite naturally impatient in everything

to reach the end without delay.

We should like to skip the intermediate stages.

We are impatient of being on the way to something

unknown, something new.

And yet it is the law of all progress

that it is made by passing through

some stages of instability –

and that it may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you:

your ideas mature gradually – let them grow,

let them shape themselves, without undue

haste.

Don’t try to force them on,

as though you could be today what time

(that is to say, grace and circumstances

acting on your own good will)

will make of you tomorrow.

Only God could say what this new spirit

gradually forming within you will be.

Give our Lord the benefit of believing

that his hand is leading you,

and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself

in suspense and incomplete.

-- Pierre Teilhard De Chardin, S.J.

(From Hearts on Fire: Praying with Jesuits, edited by Michael Harter, SJ. Chicago: Jesuit Way, an imprint of Loyola Press, 2005)

Study

http://www.usccb.org/nab/012608.shtml

“He is out of his mind.” Have your family members, friends or colleagues ever been prompted to say such a thing about YOU? I hope so. What prompted them to this conclusion about you?

What prompted Jesus’ family to this conclusion about Him?

So many people were following Jesus that his family could not even eat in their own home. Their own living arrangements were set upside down. They were thrown out of their comfort zone. Surely there can not be anything wrong with them…it must be HIM who has brought this crowd upon us.

What has Jesus done to attract such a following?

Over the last week of readings, we have seen Jesus confront the Pharisees head on for their hypocrisy. They have fought over eating with sinners and tax collectors…over healing on the Sabbath…over picking grains of wheat on the Sabbath.

After these repeated conflicts, Jesus took his disciples up a mountain. Unlike Moses who ascended Sinai alone to talk with God, Jesus took his followers up with him. Just like Joshua empowering the twelve tribes of Israel, Jesus commissioned his disciples. With the mantle passed on to him from Isaiah and the Nazareth Manifesto, Jesus now passed that on to the disciples by sending them out into the world to proclaim the Good News.

After taking on the religious establishment, Jesus heads home. Perhaps he was seeking some rest. Instead, he now finds strangers loving him and those closest to him turning their backs on his firebrand of preaching. The strangers are “inside” and the family is “outside.” Just like the Pharisees were out to get Jesus, now He also has to contend with his own family. While Jesus has “stirred the flame” in the hearts of the disciples, he also has put his own family in a position to “bear the hardships.”

In Say To This Mountain, Ched Myers (et. al) points out that the “kinship system” controlled job prospects, socialization, and personal identity. “Jesus’ family sought to rein him in no doubt for his own protection as well as for the sake of their reputation. But they find their situation reversed,” according to Myers.

Myers go on to explain that in order to weave an alternative social fabric (like the one called for in the Nazareth Manifesto), “the most basic conventions and constraints of kinship must be questioned.”

Such a program causes the Pharisees to claim Jesus is possessed by demons and his family to claim Jesus is “out of his mind.”

Action

Just the opposite is being called for in the first reading. There, Paul wants Timothy to “set right what remains to be done.” Not upset the apple cart but to set things right.

What apple cart is spilling over in your life that needs to be straightened out according to Jesus’ way? Is there a relative or old friend that you have lost touch with? Do you want to reach out to them and get your relationship back together?

Maybe you want to reach out to someone who can join you for dinner (I encourage you to include your own family and not to throw them out of the house while making room for your guest.)