RENEWsletter for September 27, 2009 - 26th Ordinary

Good morning Renewers--
When Friday comes, those of us who work at a 40+ hr/wk, Mon-Fri job breathe a sigh of relief. The work load, especially these days, if we even have a job, is grueling. And those who don't have a job but desperately need one, are hard at work trying to find one. It sometimes gets to be too much to bear. Moses had a job like that and he needed to hire a much bigger staff. So did Jesus.

The readings for next Sunday put me in mind of ecumenism, sometimes a difficult concept to get across to the really zealous ones. But Jesus says "Whoever is not against us is for us." And Moses says "Would that all the people of the Lord were prophets." Sometimes it's just not thinking clearly that causes us to try to hush others, or to oppress them. And sometimes it's just not thinking at all. Yet we can use all the help we can get!

You can find the readings for this 26th Ordinary Time Sunday on the web at: http://www.usccb.org/nab/readings/092709.shtml, and in your Bible in:

Numbers 11.25-29
Psalm 19.8, 10, 12-13, 14
James 5.1-6
Mark 9.38-43, 45, 47-48 (the official reading skips vs. 44 & 46 which may have been stuck into the Scripture later, but they don't add anything except poetic repetition)

Numbers chapter 11 opens with the Israelites complaining that they were sick of the manna and wanted meat. Moses had had it with them! He complained to the Lord, "I can't carry this whole nation all by myself. Strike me dead now and free me from this burden" (Num. 11.15). Just before the First Reading begins, God is saying, "I tell you what, Moses. Gather 70 elders and trusted leaders of the people and I'll take some of my Spirit which is on you and spread it around on them. Then you won't have to do it all by yourself" (v. 16, 17). (Gosh! Could I use something like at work!) When this happened the 70 elders began to prophesy.

I've been wondering what it means to "prophesy" (pronounced PRAH-fuh-seye). We usually think of prophecy (pronounced PRAH-fuh-see) as a prediction of the future. But it can also mean something akin to preaching. The thing is, prophets have a vision... see something... some truth... and start explaining what they see to those folks around them. That's what these 70 did, only two of them hadn't gathered at Moses's tent. They were still in the camp. Nonetheless, God knew where they were and shed some of his Spirit and them too. And they prophesied.

Now Joshua, bless his zealous heart, urged Moses to stop them (v. 28). This was irregular. They were supposed to come here to the tent. But Joshua wasn't thinking. He was taken up with the rules, not the intent of the sharing of the Spirit. What Moses said lets us see just what kind of man he was. "Are you jealous for my sake? Would that ALL the people of the LORD were prophets! Would that the LORD might bestow his Spirit on them ALL!" (v. 29). No group has, or should have, a monopoly on the Spirit of the LORD.

The Responsorial Psalm and the Second Reading are two types of "prophecy". The Psalmist bubbles over with love for the LORD. "The precepts of the LORD give joy to the heart" (Psalm 19:9). The Second Reading has James predicting the doom of the those who are laying up treasures on earth at the expense of those less powerful. See, the lesson is: Joy comes when your soul is aligned with the precepts of God, but when you oppress others, you wind up weeping and wailing over your impending miseries (James 5:1).

The Gospel story fits very well with the First Reading. Here it is the zeal of Jesus's disciples that leads them to try to stop non-followers of Jesus from exorcising demons. Now, of course it was the disciples who made up the "one holy catholic and apostolic church". This other enthusiastic, spirit-filled group was prob'ly a bunch of Baptists. The disciples weren't thinking clearly. All they saw was a transgression of the rules. But Jesus set them straight. "Whoever is not against us is for us!" (Mark 9.40). Ecumenism! There are many different parts, but the same Body (1 Corinthians 12:20). There are many different denominations, many different liturgies, but the same Lord is worshiped.

Would that ALL people worshiped the Lord!

Randy Jones
"Those who cannot abide diversity say those guys are doing it wrong!"