January 21, 2024
“The time is running out. … The world in its present form is passing away.” On this Sunday of the Word of God, St. Paul, Jonah the Prophet, and Our Lord Himself all speak of urgency. How can we make good use of our time?
Key Points
- Some times are especially critical. Are we living in such a time today?
- What lessons can we learn from Jonah about the prophecies God gives us?
- Is it better to ignore prophecies for now?
- In today’s Gospel, Jesus gives us simple, clear guidance for our times.
- What is the example we see in St. Joseph about using our time well?
This is a computer-generated transcription that has been included to make the homily searchable. It has not been verified by the author.
“I tell you, brothers, and sisters, that time is running out. From now on let those having wives act as not having them, those weeping as not weeping, those rejoicing as not rejoicing, those buying as not owning those using the world as not using it fully. For the world in its present form is passing away.” This Sunday of the Word of God, we want to be especially attentive to what the Lord is saying to us in these readings. And one thing that comes through very strongly in this passage of St. Paul, is that the time is short. And in fact, that sense of urgency is in all the readings today, St. Paul says, I tell you, brothers and sisters, the time is running out for the world in its present form is passing away. And whatever our situation is, in this world, it’s passing. Whether it’s a good situation or a bad situation, what we know is it’s passing. And so St. Paul has this strong sense of urgency, that time is running out. And so the word is always trying to distract us from that fact, with the fact that we know but the distract us from the fact that it just focused on this world, to make us forget that this is passing, and make us think that this is all that there is. And you know, there’s these billionaires who are trying to do all they can to maybe get themselves frozen as they’re dying, so that or download their mind onto some supercomputer or something to try to hold on to this world, but not wanting to accept that it’s passing. But if we have a hope for heaven, the fact that this world is passing is very good news. Because this world is not heaven, right? I mean, I think we, this world is purgatory. And so it’s very good news that it’s passing. So this time here on the earth as we get older, I’m 63. Right now, this is, I’ve never been as old as I am today. And so the older we get, the more we become aware of how passing things are. So this time is short. But it’s very important. short, but very important, because it determines our eternity. So extremely important. So that’s very different if this world is all you have to hold on to, we act one way, if this world is just a preparation for eternity, we act very differently. And in this passing world, though, there are some times which are especially important, especially crucial, and urgent, times of great change. Times maybe of a great transition, in which important decisions are being made. And we have a number of examples in the readings today. And I think the time that we’re living right now, this time, that the world and the Church is living right now is one of these critical times of decision and transition. And we know that the future can hold big surprises, that none of us can foretell, whether it’s a personal surprise, something that can happen in our own personal life, or things that can happen even in our country, in our world and the Church. But God knows all of that. And if we are listening to His word, if we are following Him, then even though we don’t know what will happen, we are in security. And so one example we have today of that is Jonah, and Jonah, a great example of prophecy. And the Lord has called our community, our little community here of the Mission Divine Mercy, to a special awareness of prophecy. And one of the one of the graces of prophecy is that God gives us a light to understand our situation, and what might be coming, a light that is beyond human light. And there’s a lot that in our little community we don’t yet have permission to share yet. But I think actually so many other also prophetic messages have spoken of how important this time is that we’re living right now difficult times, but very important. And so let’s look at this example of Jonah, a great example of prophecy. And so Jonah’s message is very stern. He says 40 days more and Nineveh will be destroyed. So that’s a very strong message. It seemed like a very harsh message. But it’s also very merciful. That’s true mercy. What if Jonah had said, when he got to Nineveh, he said, you know, everybody’s different. You all have your way of doing things that you do. Everybody does things differently. I just want to affirm you and your lifestyle choices. So what if he had said that they would have been, Oh, that’s nice. This is a nice guy. And you know, this is the very tolerant guy. But would that have woken them up? Or would the destruction have happened. And so Jonah’s message as a prophet, is to tell them that things are very different from the way they seem to them that what they’re doing is not normal. It’s an offense against God, and it will have consequences. And so that harsh message is merciful. The true mercy is always truthful. The mercy that comes from God is always telling the truth. It’s not telling people lies that feel good, but don’t really waken them up to the real danger that they’re in. And so, this example of Jonah’s prophecy also helps us see two mistakes about prophecy. One mistake, which is very common today, even in the Church is to say, well, that prophetic message, we’ll see about it. What if the people of Nineveh had said that when Jonah had said 40 days more, then Nineveh will be destroyed? And the people of Nineveh, well, we’ll wait 50 or 60 years and see what happens. Because who knows if this crazy guy is really from God or not? What would have happened in 40 days, according to the Word of the Lord, it would have been destroyed. And I think that’s oftentimes we have the reaction we have to prophecy is we just put it aside, as if it wasn’t an urgent message and so many, we’ve had so many examples in our time, like Fatima, how urgent was the message of Fatima to avoid the Communist Revolution, and all the terrible destruction of World War II. So that’s an urgent message. And if the pastors of the Church put that aside and say, well, we’ll wait many, many years, it may be too late. And many other examples, like in Kibeho and Rwanda that in 1981, our Blessed Mother appeared, and was warning the children there about, about the great danger of bloodshed. And it was about 10 years later, that terrible genocide in Rwanda, and the bishops in Rwanda afterwards approved the apparitions in Rwanda. But afterwards, perhaps that could have been avoided, certainly our Blessed Mother wanted it to be at least diminished if not completely avoided. So that was an urgent message. And Medjugorje something similar happened, basically, in the same timeframe of 1981, when those apparitions began, and warning them of the need for reconciliation. And it was about a decade later in the early 90s, that there was also the terrible wars in that area. And so these prophetic messages were urgent. There weren’t things to be put aside for years, because oftentimes, the prophetic messages are to help us live now and to help us be aware of the dangers that we’re facing. So that’s a great mercy of God, to make us aware of the dangers which are on the horizon, but we can’t see them. So that’s the first mistake is to not pay attention to prophetic messages and say, we’ll see about that much later. It may be too late. And the second mistake is to have a fatalistic response to prophetic messages, as if prophetic messages are saying, well, all these disasters, well, there’s nothing we can do. So we just have to just sit by and let it happen. The prophetic messages are almost always not calls to fatalism, because on the contrary, to action, that they’re telling us not that these things are necessary, but they’re telling us that that our actions have consequences. Our bad actions have consequences, but also our good actions have consequences. And so that’s precisely what we see in this example of Nineveh. It’s an extraordinary example. It says, “when the people of Nineveh believed God,” and notice what it says. It doesn’t say when the people of Nineveh believed Jonah. It says when the people of Nineveh believed God, they realized that through Jonah the prophet, it was God who was speaking. Just Jonah was a true prophet. He was I reluctant prophet. He didn’t want to do this. He tried to run away from his mission. He didn’t want it so but the Lord’s back there with this whole story of how that happened, so they react, it says they believed God. They believe that God was speaking through His prophet, they proclaimed the fast, and all of them great and small, put on sackcloth. When God saw by their actions, how they had turned from their evil ways, He repented of the evil that He had threatened to do to them. He did not carry it out. So again, it’s not a fatalistic message. It’s a message of I don’t want to do this. But you have to turn and change your lives so that this doesn’t happen. So prophecy is not a fatalistic message. It’s a message, on the contrary, calling us to react. So what should we do, in the Gospel today gives us a good example. So the gospel shows us another type of surprise. You know, we have that expression for tragedies, like that, you know, an earthquake or something like that, it’s calling it an act of God. But the gospel shows a very different act of God. Not a tragic act of God. But a God who surprises by this is an act of His love, of His mercy, of joy. It’s an act of God, of God intervening, God, acting, God becoming present, God present among us, because that’s what Jesus is doing. Jesus beginning His mission, and He’s revealing to them that God is there among them. We already had an example of a visitation of God to the people of Nineveh through the prophet Jonah. But this example, the gospel is even greater. It’s not just a prophet, it’s the Lord Himself. And so that’s a much greater example of an act of God. And so what does Jesus say? So this is, this is a great turning point. This is a critical, He’s announcing to the people that this is a critical time of opportunity, and decision, opportunity. But that opportunity requires a personal decision. He says, this is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. The kingdom of God is at hand, right there. And it didn’t look like the kingdom of God was at hand. They just heard this guy, Jesus of Nazareth prophesying that He’s telling them that even though it doesn’t look like that to them, this is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is right there with them. And so what should they do? What is He asking them to do? What is He inviting them to do? So He says two things. So given that this is the time of fulfillment, that the kingdom of God is at hand, He says, and so it’s a very condensed message. He says, first of all, repent, repent, like the people of Nineveh were told to repent. And so that message of repent is part of true mercy. And I emphasize that because there’s a false preaching of mercy, which ignores that. But true mercy is, first of all, and no one is more merciful than Jesus Christ, but first of all, He says, Repent. We need to turn, turn away from sin. And then He says, and believe in the gospel, Repent, and believe in the gospel, which He will reveal the gospel is He Himself, Jesus Christ. And so, there He’s giving us the example of what needs to be done. Given this urgent time, but we need to repent, turn away from sin, and above all, believe in the gospel, trust in Jesus Christ. And so we see, we see the Gospel goes on to talk about how Peter and Andrew and James and John, how they realized that this is an opportunity that they are being given. This is a time, their time, a visitation. And they need to, they are called to respond. And these the some of the people didn’t respond, but they did respond. And they accepted to even respond to the point of leaving what they had and following. So it was a time of decision, not just for them, but for all the people who are listening to Jesus. And some people respond wholeheartedly. Some people respond to kind of, some people ignored him. Some people responded by opposing him. But so do you see that this is creating a judgment? Because the judgment is not God who’s doing it, it’s each person is bringing about the judgment by their own response or lack of response. And so how, how can we put into practice what Jesus is saying, so this urgent message of believe, repent and believe in the gospel. So it doesn’t mean that we have to become workaholics running ourselves ragged with frenetic activity. So this sense of urgency doesn’t mean we have to, as I say, become workaholics. And that’s one of the reasons that God from the very beginning of creation, He established a day of sacred rest, not to be a burden for us, but on the contrary, to lighten our burdens. And to recall to us the importance of resting in the Lord and resting are not just once a week but resting in the Lord as much as possible. And one of the great examples we have, and it’s good to recall it in this chapel of St. Joseph, is St. Joseph. St. Joseph is a good example of how to live this urgency, because he was a hard worker, a very dedicated family man, working for his family, but he wasn’t a workaholic. He did what his mission was. And so he’s a good example of what St. Paul says, of using his time well, using it well, but without fear or agitation, simply doing our duty to God’s will for us, peacefully, leaving the rest in God’s hands. And so using St. Joseph, and I imagine if you’d asked people of Nazareth about St. Joseph, they would have thought that he was a very good man, very dependable, very hardworking. But he was also probably a peaceful man, not a person who seemed like a crazy, you know, crazy guy. And so he was living this urgency in the simplicity of his daily life, preparing for eternity, by living well his duties. And so in conclusion, so, remembering this word of St. Paul, I tell you, brothers and sisters, the time is running out. So again, that doesn’t mean that we have to panic. Again, that’s why I use the example St. Joseph, he wasn’t panicking. He was fulfilling his duties, doing God’s will. The world in its present form is passing away. And our Lord says, this is the time of fulfillment, the kingdom of God is at hand. And so, and I would emphasize that these times that we’re living right now, these very confusing, chaotic, dark times that we’re living right now, are special times of decision, challenging, painful times, but also blessed times, in which this situation is calling us to make choices. And I’ve been saying, and I think the time is coming very soon, when our little Mission of Divine Mercy, as I said, there’s so much that we haven’t been able to say yet in the sense of prophecy, prophetic words from the Lord. But I think the time is coming very soon in which we will be called to speak, speak much more clearly both about the evil in our world and the evil in the Church, but also about the great opportunities of God’s grace and mercy for our times. And so with our Blessed Mother, and St. Joseph, this day of the word, the Sunday of the Word of God, is an opportunity for us to open our hearts to believe in the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ. Jesus, we trust in You. Amen.
KEYWORDS / PHRASES:
1 Corinthians 7:29-31
Mark 1:14-20