BIBLE STUDY #104


TWENTYFIRST SUNDAY IF ORDINARY TIME

August 26, 2012



READING 1

JOSHUA 24:1-2A, 15-17, 18B



Joshua gathered together all the tribes of Israel at Shechem,

summoning their elders, their leaders,

their judges, and their officers.

When they stood in ranks before God,

Joshua addressed all the people:

"If it does not please you to serve the LORD,

decide today whom you will serve,

the gods your fathers served beyond the River

or the gods of the Amorites in whose country you are now dwelling.

As for me and my household, we will serve the LORD."



But the people answered,

"Far be it from us to forsake the LORD

for the service of other gods.

For it was the LORD, our God,

who brought us and our fathers up out of the land of Egypt,

out of a state of slavery.

He performed those great miracles before our very eyes

and protected us along our entire journey

and among the peoples through whom we passed.

Therefore we also will serve the LORD, for he is our God."



The Word of the Lord



READING 2

EPHESIANS 5:21-32



Brothers and sisters:

Be subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Wives should be subordinate to their husbands as to the Lord.

For the husband is head of his wife

just as Christ is head of the church,

he himself the savior of the body.

As the church is subordinate to Christ,

so wives should be subordinate to their husbands in everything.

Husbands, love your wives,

even as Christ loved the church

and handed himself over for her to sanctify her,

cleansing her by the bath of water with the word,

that he might present to himself the church in splendor,

without spot or wrinkle or any such thing,

that she might be holy and without blemish.

So also husbands should love their wives as their own bodies.

He who loves his wife loves himself.

For no one hates his own flesh

but rather nourishes and cherishes it,

even as Christ does the church,

because we are members of his body.

For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother

and be joined to his wife,

and the two shall become one flesh.

This is a great mystery,

but I speak in reference to Christ and the church.



The Word of the Lord



GOSPEL

JOHN 6:60-69



Many of Jesus' disciples who were listening said,

"This saying is hard; who can accept it?"

Since Jesus knew that his disciples were murmuring about this,

he said to them, "Does this shock you?

What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending

to where he was before?

It is the spirit that gives life,

while the flesh is of no avail.

The words I have spoken to you are Spirit and life.

But there are some of you who do not believe."

Jesus knew from the beginning the ones who would not believe

and the one who would betray him.

And he said,

"For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me

unless it is granted him by my Father."



As a result of this,

many of his disciples returned to their former way of life

and no longer accompanied him.

Jesus then said to the Twelve, "Do you also want to leave?"

Simon Peter answered him, "Master, to whom shall we go?

You have the words of eternal life.

We have come to believe

and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God."



The Gospel of the Lord



Reflection

Today's Gospel is the fifth and final week of the bread of life discourse in which we have been hearing about faith in Jesus and the Eucharist. In previous weeks, Jesus has been talking to people in general, but today he speaks to his disciples specifically. Not surprisingly, many of the disciples find Jesus teaching about the Eucharist too difficult to believe.



They are murmuring, like the Jews did in the desert on their way to the Promised Land, until God provides manna in the desert. The disciples find the concepts Jesus is teaching in the bread of life discourse too hard to believe, and who can blame them? The first problem they would have is the idea of eternal life. Until about 100 years before Jesus, the Jews didn't have any concept of eternal life; it was earthly life that was important. To think that they would live forever was a foreign concept to most people; certainly they wouldn't think about it as we do today.



A second issue causing difficulty is believing that Jesus came down from heaven and is the life giving revealer of God. In other words, they have a problem with the Incarnation, with the Son of God becoming human. They know Jesus' family, they know where he comes from; how can they believe this?



A third issue is believing in the Eucharist, in believing that Jesus body and blood, soul and divinity is contained in the bread and wine (see last week's bible study)



What will also be difficult will be to see Jesus suffer and die. But after he rises to the Father, he will send the Spirit which gives life, and they will begin to believe through faith, which is a gift from the Father. It is then that Jesus' words will begin to make sense and will become life giving to them.



It is the Spirit that guides and directs us to the truth because the flesh is weak. We aren’t able to be the disciples we can be on our own. We will doubt and fail unless we open up ourselves to the Spirit who will reveal all truth and give us faith in the Father. Jesus teachings become effective when we have faith inspired by the Spirit.



It seems to me that some of the disciples of Jesus find his teachings to be difficult and give up on him because they don’t understand in a human sense (with their human minds) what Jesus is talking about. Failure to have faith in Jesus means failure to have faith in what he teaches, and they go away.



Notice that Jesus doesn’t water down his teachings so his disciples will believe. He allows those who doubt to leave rather than be unfaithful to his God given mission.



Peter is willing to give Jesus the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think he understood anymore than anyone else, but he believes in Jesus as the “Holy One of God” who has “the words of eternal life.” He has faith in Jesus, and is led by the Spirit after Pentecost to fulfill the plan God has for him.



We don’t always understand how God works and where he is leading us or what he is trying to teach us through Scripture and Tradition, either, but we need to have faith in the Church, and in Jesus and his teachings, and let the Spirit guide and direct us to the truth so we can fulfill our God given mission, also.



In today’s first reading from Joshua, we see where Joshua gathers all of Israel and asks them to decide what god they will serve. People at that time believed that many gods existed; it wasn’t a matter of believing in God or not (atheism is a modern concept and alien to any ancient culture) but what god to believe in. Why did they choose Yahweh? Because he is the One who freed them from bondage in Egypt, fed them in the desert, gave them the Law, and brought them to the Promised Land. This was their concept of salvation, and earthly one, not a heavenly one.



The second reading is a difficult one. The church even provides a shorter reading that eliminates language that is objectionable to women. But the sentence prior to this objectionable language also states, “Brothers and sisters: Be subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ.” I take this to mean that we are to serve each other as Christ served us; we are to be kind, caring, sacrificing, loving, and generous to each other. In other words, to be virtuous and love as Christ loved us. At one time men did ‘rule the roost’ so to speak and wives did defer to their husbands decisions (at least publicly, anyway – we all knew who the power behind the scenes was!). St Paul was being culturally consistent. He was showing one way Christians fit into general society. We certainly don’t believe that anymore. We serve each other in humility and kindness, looking out for the needs of each other. If both partners do this, I think there will be a very successful marriage. Like Jesus, we came to serve, not to be served.





Fr. Phil