The readings for the Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C) May be found at:
I like free stuff. Who here doesn’t like to get things for free?
I also like bargains. That’s why we have yard sales, QVC, eBay, Amazon Prime Day, T.J. Maxx, Black Friday, Tax Free Weekend - the list goes on and on. We like to get as much as we can for the lowest possible cost, don’t we?
In today’s Gospel, large crowds were travelling with Jesus.
But, Jesus knew that they weren’t truly following Him.
Jesus saw this large crowd and knew why they were there. They loved the miracles, the healing and the free food. He knew, they wanted the benefits of what He did rather than an understanding of who He was. He knew they loved His gifts, but not the life He was calling them to. Essentially he tells the large crowd, something for nothing is not how this works. Following him is not free.
If we are completely honest with ourselves, we know, at times that we are not too different from that large crowd. We want the good stuff. We want as much of it as possible, but we want it at the lowest possible cost or we want it for free.
These bargains don’t just stop at stuff - it extends to our spiritual life, doesn’t it?
We want Holy Communion, we want the Eucharist. But we don’t want Confession, with its Examination of Conscience to properly dispose our souls for communion with our Lord.
We want a relationship with Christ. But we don’t want to invest the time to talk and to listen to Him or to spend time with His Word on a regular basis. Too many other things to do in our busy lives.
We want access to the sacraments for us and for our families - a beautiful Church for Baptism, weddings, Holy Mass and the Rite of Christian Funerals, but we don’t always want to make the choices we need to make each and every day to ensure we live our lives in a way that is in line with what Jesus and His Church are calling us to.
If we are honest with ourselves - most of the time, we want what we want, when we want it. We want all the blessings of heaven - but with the least amount of sacrifice possible. We want free stuff. We want a bargain. Just like the large crowd in today’s Gospel.
Now, Jesus is telling us that’s not how it works.
Salvation might be free. But being a follower of Jesus costs.
The Good News is that Jesus gave us a model of what it means to be His follower. He showed us through prayer, the scriptures and His commandments.
Jesus prayed. A lot. To be a true follower of Jesus, we need to be having an ongoing conversation with God through an active prayer life. This means more than just reciting rote prayers we learned when we were small children. This means having regular conversations with God. By talking to Him and by listening to Him. We can’t do this by multi-tasking. We need to make the time.
Jesus knew the Scriptures and referred to them often. True followers of Jesus need to be students of the Word and allow it to guide us in how we conduct our lives. We need to spend time reading and reflecting on His Word. Doing spiritual reading and letting it filter out to the other parts of our life.
True followers do what Jesus did and care about the things that Jesus cares about. This may mean leaving behind some things that matter the most to us and making the things of God a higher priority. Can we leave behind sinful habits or things that get in the way of our relationship with Jesus so we can focus more on what He is calling us to do? That’s not easy, that’s not free.
No person and no thing is more important than our relationship with Jesus, because our relationship with Him shapes, defines and affects all our other relationships, all aspects of our lives; who we are, what we say, and what we do.
We can’t invest in our relationship with Jesus if our focus is everywhere else, if we don’t put in the time and effort or if we expect all the benefits of that relationship without giving anything in return - without giving up those things that get in the way of our relationship with Him.
When you start to work it out, the cost of following Jesus is pretty significant. It’s not free.
But, when you think about it, the cost of not following Jesus is even greater.
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