September 13, 2009 24th Ordinary Sunday of the Year Is. 50:5-9; James 2:14-18; Mk. 8:27-35 _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   Readings:http://www.usccb.org/nab/091309.shtml   ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________   When Jesus asked his disciples that day, "Who do people say that I am?" they had no trouble answering that question. As many prominent names as they could pull out of their Bible or from their community, they offered up. When Jesus asked, "Who do you say that I am?," their confidence and investment in him, and all that he was, was being tested. This was a much more difficult question to answer, because they had to answer it with their lives and not just with their brains. The question: “Who do you say that I am?” cuts to the heart of Christianity. Each person must answer this question, amid the changing currents and circumstances of life.   Accepting this assessment of Christianity is one of the hardest things in the world. They are the words spoken by Jesus more times than any other he ever uttered: "For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake and the Gospel, will save it." It runs counter to what we want to believe.   The hard sayings - on denying one’s very self, taking up the cross and losing one’s life if one wants to save it - are challenges to anyone who wants to follow Jesus on the way. Following Jesus asks for a life that in one way or another has the cross deeply embedded in it. There is sacrifice expected. We give up our lives. Playing it safe no longer is an acceptable philosophy. ­ Jesus makes absolutely clear that God cares about a holiness that can reside in us, a holiness that will bring joy and meaning to our life. If you want to have a worthwhile life, you're going to have to look for ways to give that life away. If you want to save your life, you're going to have to think more of loving than of being loved, more of understanding than of being understood, more of forgiving than of being forgiven.   The Bible bears witness to a God, who hears the cries of the poor, who defends the orphans and widows and the immigrants, a God who suffers with the people, a God who comes among us as a vulnerable baby, born among the homeless, spent his early years as an immigrant, lived a common life, associated with the outcasts, compared receiving the kingdom to a little child, executed as a criminal, buried in a borrowed tomb. The message is profound. There is One who has moved into our vulnerability, our guilt, our alienation, our suffering, our death. God has claimed our weakness as a resource for divine power.     <<   Previous: 23rd Sunday of the Year  |   Next: 25th Sunday of the Year >>     Go Back to SERMONS (Year B)