God’s People!

Monday, October 14, 2024

Gal 4:22-24, 26-27, 31-5:1; Lk 11:29-32

Today’s Gospel highlights that being God’s people is not only a privilege but an important responsibility too.

In the Gospel, we find Jesus angry and disappointed over those unrepentant people who also demand a sign so that they would repent. 

It is not that Jesus shows his impatience at their request. But their request comes despite seeing him perform many different signs through his ministry of healing and preaching. 

Similarly, it is not that Jesus calls them evil because they demand a sign. Rather, their intention is to put Jesus to the test by demanding a sign from him. 

Though Gentiles are more receptive to his message, Jesus is pained by the fact that his own people are indifferent to it. 

The queen of the south and the Ninevites are examples of those who believed in Solomon’s wisdom and Jonah’s message, respectively, without demanding a sign. 

While the queen of the south traveled from the ‘ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon,’ the Ninevites accepted God’s Word coming from Jonah and repented. 

But God’s people are unable to deliver when a stronger faith is expected of them. 

By their disbelief, they fail Jesus, and they fail God, who sent Jesus for their sake. 

At times, the believing community only counts the privilege of being Christians and forgets the obligation to live as God’s people in word and deed. 

Mere pride in our identity as Christians would be self-defeating if it were not accompanied by a set of values that characterize and define God’s people. 

Being Christians is a real privilege if we live up to the expectations of what entails such identity.

Let us pray that our lives may offer evidence of the fact that we are God’s people. 

Fr. Dhinakaran Savariyar