Colossians 1:1-8 / Luke 4:38-44
Paul rejoices in the Colossians; Their faith is bearing fruit.
Albert Cylwicki tells this story in his book “If Today You Hear His Voice”. During World War I, members of a London congregation decorated their church with stalks of ripe corn for a harvest liturgy. That night the church was destroyed in a bombing raid. All that winter it lay in ruins. When spring came, green sprouts emerged from the church’s rubble. All summer long the sprouts grew. When fall came, the church’s congregation reaped a remarkable harvest of corn. The Gospel is like those seeds of ripe corn. Nothing can keep it from bearing fruit. The Colossians are a living witness to this.
***
Do we sometimes grow discouraged that the Gospel isn’t
bearing more fruit in our modern
world? “Some seed fell on good soil,
and when it grew, it produced fruit a hundredfold.” Luke 8:8
***
The younger Paul used to address his letters to the churches
(so the letters to the Thessalonians, the Corinthians, and the Galatians). As
Paul became older, he addressed them to God's dedicated people. The concrete
person gained over the abstract group. Again, he begins with the three: Faith,
Hope and Love. Every time, he speaks about the three, he paraphrases them
differently. These three form the bond that Joins him to Colossae. Colossae is
the most insignificant town he ever wrote to. But the content of the letter is
what makes it so significant. Epaphras had founded the church and he came to
Rome to report to Paul. He had many good things to say about the people.
However, a new heresy had also appeared there, one which the early church had
to cross swords with for a long time: Gnosticism. The Gnostics were great
intellectuals, Gnosis means knowledge. They held that it is the knowledge of
God by which man is saved, not an intellectual but a mystic knowledge, a secret
knowledge, given only to the devotee. It joined hands with spiritism. The world
was full of them. Christ had no place in this philosophy. Salvation, they said,
comes from knowledge, not from a person. To this we owe the greatest doctrine
ever written on Christ. In Christ dwells the fullness of divinity. He, not
spirits, is the fullness of the universe. From him, we have the goodness, which
spreads and transforms the world with God’s grace. To those in danger of
heresy, he gives the deepest of Christian theology ever written and the fullness of his affection
and love.
***
Paul thanks God and the Colossians that the good news of
Jesus Christ has taken root among the Colossians and is spreading all over the
Roman world.
***
Very often we hear people say that they are busy. And of course, we too have said that before. But it is good to ask ourselves, just what are we busy with. If we are busy with the right things, then we will feel productive and that what we are busy with is heading towards a direction. But if we are busy with the wrong things, then we may just be running around in circles and not really going anywhere.
In the gospel, we heard about a day in the life of Jesus, and it was a really busy day. From the synagogue, He went to Simon's house and healed Simon's mother-in-law of her fever. Then after sunset, those who had friends suffering from diseases of one kind or another brought them to Jesus, and laying His hands on each He cured them. But just when everyone was looking for Him and to make Him stay, Jesus said, "I must proclaim the Good News of the kingdom of God to the other towns too, because that is what I was sent to do."
Jesus knew what He had to be busy with, and even though He
can fulfil the needs of the people, He kept focused on what He had to do. May
we also think about what we are doing and what we are busy with. Let us pray
that we know what the Lord wants of us and let us get busy with that.
***
Jesus has preached his message of hope in the lake town of
Capernaum and confirmed it by liberating the poor and the sick from the powers
of evil. He has to bring the same good news to other places. The gospel of hope
in a new world is destined for all. With the people healed by Jesus, let us in
this eucharist thank the Lord for his good news.
***
Prayer
Lord our God, we thank you today for Jesus, your Son. He
came to heal our wounds and to set us going on the way to you and to one
another. Help us in our fumbling, stumbling attempts to continue looking for
him and to make his gospel of hope and love come true among us as the good news
that your Son is alive among us and that he is our Lord for ever. Amen
