In today’s Gospel Jesus meets
his apostles as they return from traveling to spread the Good News of Jesus and
teach others about him. They must have been so excited to see their friends and
Jesus again and to share all about how God had worked through them! Yet in a
silent but powerful lesson Jesus instructs them to come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.
Instead of staying together, sharing food and wine, Jesus instructs them to go
in solitude to reflect and rest in God.
Jesus, in his wisdom, knew that
his apostles needed time to pray, reflect and rest in God. We too are in desperate
need of time spent in solitude in a deserted place to pray, reflect and rest in
God. Jesus told his apostles to go to a deserted place to retreat since the
crowds following Jesus and his apostles
were coming and going in great numbers, and they had no opportunity even to eat.
Like so many of our dangerously busy lives, they had people who constantly wanted
and needed things from them. How often are our lives so busy and full with meeting
deadlines at work, rushing to numerous activities, or attending to the needs of
family and friends that we don’t even find the time to eat? When we are so busy
that we don’t even take the time to attend to our own basic physical needs of
eating, sleeping, exercising, etc. we fortunately see the physical reminders of
this: a rumbling stomach, bags under our eyes, exhaustion, crankiness, lethargy,
etc. and we are reminded that we need to stop and take care of ourselves.
Yet if we sometimes have trouble
taking care of our obvious physical needs how well are we taking care of our inner-spirit
and the needs of our inner life? The reminders that we are not taking time to
feed our spiritual life are not as immediately obvious as bags under our eyes
or a rumbling stomach, but the consequences of not feeding our spiritual life
are serious. Taking time to nourish the Spirit of God within us is essential to
being the healthy and life-giving people that God created us to be; feeding our
spiritual needs is essential to happiness.
After Jesus sent his apostles
into solitude, today’s Gospel story finishes with Jesus being moved with pity for [the crowd] for they
were like sheep without a shepherd and he began to teach them many things.
Jesus never tires of being with us and healing us, but he will not force
himself on us, we have to be relentless like the crowd to come to him; he will
never turn us away. We have to be relentless self-advocates for our hidden,
inner life where God is waiting to hold us and heal us.
Questions for Reflection and
Discussion
-Am I overcommitted or over
scheduled? If so, what limits do I need to set or what do I need to cut out?
-When during the day do I take
time to feed my inner life?
-Do I celebrate Sunday well as
the Day of Rest?
-One thing I will do differently
this week is…
No comments:
Post a Comment