Sunday 18th June 2023 - Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Exodus 19:2-6/ Psalm 99(100)/ Romans 5:6-11/ Matthew 9:36-10:8

Those of us who are parents understand what the concept of unconditional love is. Hopefully, if we were fortunate as children, we experienced the love our parents had for us. Parental love tends towards a love that no matter what a child does the love a parent has for the child cannot be diminished. This of course is an ideal and as human beings even the love we have for our children will be flawed to one degree or another from time to time. The love that God, our creator, has for us is perfect and truly unconditional. It doesn’t matter what we do God’s love for us cannot be diminished. The separation we might feel from God’s love is not of God’s making but is a consequence of our failures, our sins. It is the God of love that redeems us from these failures and fills in the gulf that sin creates between us and God. God is the definition of Love and in the face of repeated rejection is constant in forgiveness. We can rely on the steadfastness of God’s promise to us in the face of our inconsistency towards him.

From the very beginning humanity strayed from God’s love. We know this from the story of Adam and Eve. We also know from this very early scripture that God had a plan to redeem us from the consequences of that betrayal from the moment it occurred. God chose the Israelite people to be the race from which the redeemer would emerge. These people were led out of slavery in Egypt for a purpose. God trained them in his ways in the desert, forming them into a nation, providing them with nourishment and giving them a set of rules to live by. We tend to think of rules and laws as restricting us, but the rules given to us by God are a template for living a peaceful life in harmony with each other and with God. They do not restrict us they liberate us, giving us the freedom to grow and develop in the love of God and each other.

When humanity considers itself superior to God it bends and twists the guidance God provided for us. God’s guidance leads us to respect God and each other, to have regard for the sanctity of life, relationships, and the need for dependency on God. It gives us the freedom to live in harmony with God and each other. When humanity believes it knows better than God these precious guidelines are warped and new and restrictive laws come in to being that destroy freedoms, forcing people to accept what is right or wrong depending on the thinking of the time, and even threatening life itself. Humanity strays from the precepts of God’s laws at its peril and we see the results all around us as the sacredness of human life and dignity is increasingly degraded. We find ourselves enslaved by human law rather than set free by God’s law.

The chosen people of Israel turned from God repeatedly, but nothing could dimmish the steadfast love God had for the nation he had chosen. Time and time again the people rebelled but God forgave. In the fullness of time and to fulfil God’s promise of redemption he sent his son Jesus into the world, to live, suffer and die taking on all the rejection that humanity displayed then and has continued to display since and doubtlessly will continue to display in the future. This is the unconditional love God has for us his created children, a love that no matter what we do, we are forgiven, and all our sins have been cancelled out by Jesus.

In the readings today we can see the parallels between the Old and New Testaments, the old relationship with God and the new. God claimed the Israelite people as his own, he led them from slavery into freedom although they had to go through a period of formation in the desert. The purpose was to provide a nation from which God’s kingdom and the Saviour would emerge. The twelve tribes of Israel became a nation of priests, nurturing the word of God and spreading it to others.

Jesus reconstituted this nation founding it on the twelve apostles creating a permanent body called to work with God to establish his kingdom on earth, leading us from the slavery of sin into the freedom of salvation. We are now the chosen people who are commissioned to carry on God’s work building up his kingdom on earth. Just as the Apostles were called by name we are also called by name at our Baptism. The apostles had their mission and so do we. Jesus felt sorry for the crowds who appeared like sheep without a shepherd. If we look around our world today, we see the same situation. There are many who appear to be sheep without a shepherd or worse, being led astray by packs of wolves determined to scatter and destroy God’s people. We are the labourers called to help with God’s harvest. In baptism we come to share in the ministry of Jesus as priest, prophet, and King.

Although we continue to rebel against God’s will the love God has for us, manifested in Jesus, surpasses the disobedience of humanity. God is always true to his word and no matter what we do his redeeming love and forgiveness will always be available to us. The chosen people of the Old Testament, who turned away from God again and again, still provided the background from which our Saviour, Jesus, emerged. From this nation the message of salvation spread throughout the world and down the ages. Jesus reaffirmed God’s unfailing faithfulness and established us, his church, to continue the work of salvation. Although we remain susceptible to failure and temptation our faith gives us a joyful trust in God and his unfailing love for us. We are the way that God’s love and compassion can be brought to the straying sheep of today. God continues to provide shepherds through his church, and we are all called to be labourers for God’s rich harvest.

God Bless Brendan