January 27, 2002

As Jesus begins his public life, he gathers around him a community of disciples to be a sign of God's reign in the world, a light shining in the darkness. When he proclaims to the people: "Reform your lives! The kingdom of heaven is at hand," Jesus is inviting them to form their life together into a "place" from which God's loving kindness shines. When he entreats the disciples to "Come after me and I will make you fishers of men," Jesus is urging them to follow him in self-giving love so that the world will turn to his glorious light.

Personal choices are founded in self-giving love that values all people as members of one family. It is neither "all about me" nor "us against them." This is what both Jesus and Paul had in mind in today's Scriptures. They gathered believers and encouraged them to let God reform them into communities of love and unity. Neither Paul nor Jesus envisioned the communities they gathered as exclusive heirs of salvation. Instead, the love of Christ was to unite them and reach out to all people and draw them into God's reign where all are valued members of the family of God.

The word CHURCH means assembly or gathering. In our Sunday gathering for the Eucharist, we pay that all the people God has gathered may be brought together in unity and become one body, one spirit in Christ, for the peace and salvation of all the world and for the glory of God. Are we the GATHERING allowing the Eucharist we eat and drink to bind us to one another in unity and in love?

SO THE QUESTION: HOW DOES GOD WANT TO REFORM YOU? HOW ARE YOU TRYING TO "COME AFTER" CHRIST?

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