Archive for August 23rd, 2020

Blessed Are You 8-23-2020

Sunday, August 23rd, 2020

They were surrounding him. They were simple people:
his disciples, fishermen, people who did not think very much
of themselves. People nobody thought very much of.
Nobody ever asked their opinions. Nobody ever paid much
attention to what they thought or felt. The people who
mattered looked down on them. They smelled of fish. The
smell came out of their hair and out of their clothing.
And now Jesus whom they had followed as their model,
whom they had imitated like children, whom they were
surprised to be allowed to follow, asked them, “What name
would you give me? Who do you people say that I am?”
They could not believe their ears. It was impossible that
he was asking for their opinion. That is why they started
telling him what the scribes, the priests, the Pharisees, the
political leaders, and the important ones were saying. They answered, “They say, those other ones say that you are John
the Baptizer, others say Jeremiah, others Elijah, and again
others, one of the prophets.”
Then he said, “But you, who do you say I am?” They
looked at one another. Was he really going to pay attention
to what they thought? Again they looked at one another.
They nudged Peter, who was obviously their leader, and he
said, “I know who you are, we know who you are. You are
the Messiah, you are the Son of the Living God.”
And then Jesus said something strange. He said, “Peter,
how blessed you are because you do not say that of yourself.
What you said came from God, God in you.”
What Jesus said of Peter, he also said to us. I pray that we
believe that Jesus is the Messiah. I pray that we believe that
Jesus is the Son of God. I hope that is the reason we come
together today. That same God who was in Peter must be in us. We are
charged with God’s spirit. We are full of the Son’s spirit.
God is in us.
A lot of us have the bad habit of thinking of ourselves as
totally negative, as non-participants in so many affairs, as in
a sense, good-for-nothing. Just like the early disciples
thought of themselves.
Others are important – others are leading the world. We
forget the good in us – we forget God in us. We overlook our
potential – our dignity.
I read about an African Bishop, who was described as a
contemporary saint by TIME magazine. He was from
Tanzania. Bishop Christopher said we need two types of
confessional boxes in our churches, some at the right side and
some at the left side. In the left ones, you confess your sins,
getting as a penance to go to the right side with the obligation
to confess honestly the good you did, the good in you, the God in you. That is what Jesus said of Peter. Blessed are you, Peter. God is with you. That is what I say to you. God
is with you – in you. Don’t forget it! Live like you believe
it. Blessed are you!