Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: This is Sundays with Bishop Ken.
Thanks for sharing some quiet time with the Lord.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: Today. Our guest reader is Fr. Burt Gome, a senior priest from the diocese of Saginaw in Michigan. Father Burt was a priest in the diocese when Bishop Ken was its shepherdess.
[00:00:33] Speaker C: A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Mark again, Jesus left the district of Tyre and went by way of Sidon to the sea of Galilee into the district of the decapolis.
And people brought to him a deaf man who had a speech impediment and begged him to lay his hands on him.
He took him off by himself, away from the crowd.
He put his finger into the man's ears and, spitting, touched his tongue.
Then he looked up to heaven and groaned and said to him, ephet be opened.
And immediately the man's ears were opened. His speech impediment was removed, and he spoke plainly.
He ordered them not to tell anyone. But the more he ordered them not to, the more they proclaimed it. They were exceedingly astonished, and they said, he has done all things well. He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak the gospel of the Lord.
Christianity, before it was called Christianity, was called the way.
In the acts of the apostles, which is Luke's account of the early christian community.
The way is used nine times.
For example, the first time it's used is in reference to Paul before he became a Christian. When it says, Saul asks the high priest for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, that if he should find any men or women who belonged to the way, he might bring them back to Jerusalem in chains.
Later on, we read, when Barnabas found Saul, he brought him back to Antioch, and for a whole year, they met with the church and instructed a large number of people.
It was in Antioch that the disciples were first called christians.
It's fine that we're called christians, but beneath it all is a way of life.
At baptism, we go down into the water and symbolically die to one way of living and then rise to a new and different way of life.
It's a new way of seeing God, ourselves, other people, all creation.
And because we see things differently, we act differently toward God, ourselves, other people, and all creation.
This is what lies behind the miracle. In today's gospel passage, Jesus opens the man's ears and frees his tongue.
In a few verses later, he will open the eyes of a blind man.
The miracles of Jesus are called signs. They weren't a patchwork attempt to clean up all the problems in the world. They were signs to teach us.
Jesus is teaching that we need to open ourselves to a new experience of all that is around us. And it is God who is all around us.
The truth is, this is not something any of us can do.
This is something only God can do.
This is something so colossal that only God can give us the gift of being able to experience this.
Because to experience this is to experience God.
Our role is like that of the farmer who plows the field, removes the stones from the field, plants some seeds, digs up the weeds, but the farmer can't produce the sun to shine on the field or the rain to fall on it.
In the same way, it is only God who can send the Holy spirit upon us to live within us.
It is God who takes all the initiative. It is only God who can draw us to God.
That a creature experiences, God who is beyond all understanding that a creature relates to God, that a creature is drawn toward God who is totally beyond us.
All of this is something no human being can accomplish.
In John's gospel, Jesus says, no one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws them.
All of us can make the mistake of thinking we're consumers, as though we look at different options and decide to become a disciple of the Lord. A consumer's choice. Oh no.
There is God in us. And to respond to God is what we're drawn to do.
And the draw was put there by God.
No one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws them.
St. Augustine said, our hearts were made for God, and they will not rest until they rest in God.
The psalmist sings, as the deer longs for the running streams, so my soul longs for you, o God. I it is God who put this in us. It is God who enables us to respond.
There is an interesting detail in today's gospel. Jesus takes the man who is deaf and mute off by himself, away from the crowd, just the two of them, Jesus and the man.
That's what it always comes down to. It's me and God.
It's not a consumer's choice.
It's whether or not I want to be what I am made to be, or whether I want to close in on myself and be deaf, blind, mute.
God takes all the initiative. It is God who sought me, not I who sought God. All I do is respond and allow to open before me a whole new way of seeing God, myself, others creation, and each day walk well this wonderful path called the way.
[00:07:05] Speaker A: Thanks for joining us today. If you like this week's reflection, subscribe.
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[00:07:37] Speaker A: Sundays with Bishop Ken is produced by Little Books of the Diocese of Saginaw. For more about little books and great resources for the whole family, visit littlebooks.org dot.
