FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

FIRST READING: DEUTERONOMY 18:15-20

RESPONSORIAL PSALM: PSALMS 95:1-2, 6-9

SECOND READING: 1 CORINTHIANS 7:32-35

GOSPEL: MARK 1:21-28

In the first reading Moses assures the people of Israel that God will raise up from their midst a prophet like himself. God will put His words into his mouth. In the Gospel we see this prophecy fulfilled in a way that far exceeds what Moses foresaw. The first reading always compliments the Gospel reading somehow. To understand what is going on, we can ask, what was Moses for the people of Israel? What did he do for them? God used him to bring them out from slavery in Egypt. He brought about them freedom from their enemies.

On most Sundays of year B, we read from the Gospel according to St. Mark. Remember that each of the four Gospel writers told the story of Jesus from his own perspective. The interpretative key to unlocking each Gospel is to look at the episode each evangelist places at the beginning of the public ministry of Jesus. It is a different episode in each of the four Gospels. That episode functions like a lens through which the evangelist invites us to see how the story unfolds. John’s Gospel for instance begins with the wedding feast at Cana. Six jars of water are turned into an abundance of the very best of wine. That is the symbol of abundance of grace and or life in abundance. Thus Jesus will later say, “I have come that they may have life and have it in full.

Luke begins the public ministry of Jesus with His return to Nazareth. Jesus had already moved to Capernaum but He returns to his home town and goes to the synagogue on the Sabbath day. The people are amazed at His wisdom but Jesus stirs up their fury by reminding them of two stories from the scriptures; first when God sent the prophet Elijah to a widow of a Macedonian town during the time of drought and famine, second is the story about Elisha healing an Assyrian leper Naaman. These two stories are about God’s graciousness to the outsiders, to people who are not Jewish. So, Luke in the Gospel of Luke is the embodiment of hospitality, He welcomes everybody.

Matthew begins with the sermon on the mountain. Just as Moses ascends the mountain and receives the Torah, Jesus also ascends the mountain and begins to teach. Jesus is the new and greater Moses. To understand the perspective of Mark, we notice that Mark begins his story about Jesus by telling us that His teaching made a deep impression on the people because he taught them with authority. He tells us that Jesus was immediately confronted by a man possessed by an unclean spirit. In what way does this reflect Mark’s perspective. Mark’s Gospel is sometimes scary. It takes the reader into a world inhabited by demons and evil forces with which Jesus is constantly in conflict. He calls them variously, devil, Satan, unclean spirit, Beelzebul, the prince of demons, one demon called himself legion because there are many of them. The question of the man with an unclean spirit encapsulates the whole mission of Jesus in Mark’s Gospel. Have you come to destroy us? Jesus has come to destroy the kingdom of Satan, set us free and to establish the kingdom of God. We are living in enemy occupied territory. Our situation is so grave and irremediable from within, only divine intervention can save us. What is happening in the Gospel is that the prince of this world is now under attack. The rescue mission has started and the kingdom of God is indeed near. 

The second reading last Sunday told us that the form of this world is passing away. Immediately after saying that, Paul lunches into his discussion of the difference between the married state and the celibate state. If you look at the New Testament as a whole and especially in the teachings of Jesus, it is very clear that the idea or rational behind consecrated virginity, behind abstinence from sexual relations or living a celibate life is for the sake of the kingdom of God. The rationale is eschatological. It is based on the understanding that marriage is something that belongs to this passing world and that virginity and celibacy anticipates the life of the world to come. It anticipates the new creation.  St Paul is making a case for a single minded devotion to the things of God and so he urges us to see that nothing hinders our devotion to God and His kingdom that has come among us in Christ.

Happy Sunday

Fr Chidi Onwuka msscc