Allegiance to the Lord!

Sunday, August 25, 2024

Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time

Jos 24:1-2,15-17,18; Eph 5:21-32; Jn 6:60-69

The twenty-first week invites us to ask if our allegiance is to the Lord. 

The readings challenge the taken-for-granted assumptions about our faith and compel a reflection on our faith as a commitment and allegiance to the Lord.

In the first reading, we find Joshua, whose earthly life is nearly over, pledging his household to the service of the Lord. After presenting reasons for national gratitude, Joshua calls on the community to declare if they would serve the Lord. While giving them the freedom to decide, he urges them to put away the strange gods they were inclined to worship. Hence, their decision to serve the Lord required that they give up idolatry and serve the Lord in truth and sincerity. 

The second reading highlights the ideal spousal relationship, imitating the example of Christ. Paul holds that acknowledging the leadership of Christ calls for abolishing domination in the spousal relationship. As such, Paul instructs the Ephesian community to submit to one another in Jesus’ name. He uses the example of Christ and the Church to show how the mutuality of respect and reverence should unfold within the family setting. 

The Gospel text presents the straightforwardness of Jesus’ words. Though the beginning of chapter six presented the miracle of multiplication and the fact that the followers of Jesus were trying to make Jesus a king, the later verses show that the same crowd entered into a profound disagreement with him. They could not accept Jesus’ claim that he was the bread from heaven, so they left in droves, and only the twelve apostles remained. We find Jesus giving freedom to the apostles, either to follow or leave him. However, Peter comes up with a beautiful confession of Jesus’ divinity. In his confession, Peter also represents the community of apostles and their decision to stay with Jesus, no matter what. 

The readings of the twenty-first Sunday invite us to reflect on three themes. 

Movement: If we believe in Christ, then we cannot relive our past. Our faith in Christ should only cause a forward movement and not a movement backward. The first reading shows that the Israelite community cannot hold on to their idolatry practices if it decides to pledge its allegiance to God. The second reading highlights that our faith in Christ should only help us commit to each other in a family with no place for domination between spouses. The Gospel text offers proof that many who accompanied Jesus were fair-weather followers. When there was a disagreement, many of them returned to their ‘former’ way of life. But our faith in Jesus should help us hold on to him through thick and thin, just as Peter declares. As followers of Jesus, what movement are we characterized by?

Gratitude: Following Jesus requires that we humbly acknowledge God’s goodness that has been holding us up from the past, continuing in the present, and offering a safeguard for the future. The first reading shows that the Israelite community remembers its past with gratitude. As a result, they now like to live for God. In the Gospel, we find the crowd of deserters to be ungrateful because they wanted to make Jesus king only when they liked him. But they did not hesitate to leave him when they found his teachings unacceptable. Whereas we find the apostles grateful because they remember Jesus’ goodness towards them. The confession of Jesus’ divinity by Peter manifests the faith and gratitude of the apostles in him. 

Commitment: Gratitude leads to commitment. In the first reading, the national gratitude of the Israelite community is revealed in their commitment to be faithful to the Lord, led by Joshua himself. In the second reading, Paul reminds us that faith in God’s leadership should be witnessed in love, equality, and respect between spouses. In the Gospel, we find that by choosing to stay with the Lord, the apostles commit themselves to altruistic discipleship. The lives of the apostles became a wonderful testament to the fact that their commitment was not just verbal. Their love for the Lord was seen in their martyrdom. 

Let us pray that we may mature into Christians whose allegiance will always be to the Lord!

Fr. Dhinakaran Savariyar