Gospel & Reflection for the Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time.
Luke 12:32‐48
Jesus said to his disciples:
‘See that you are dressed for action and have your lamps lit. Be like men waiting for their master to return from the wedding feast, ready to open the door as soon as he comes and knocks. Happy those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes. I tell you solemnly, he will put on an apron, sit them down at table and wait on them. It may be in the second watch he comes, or in the third, but happy those servants if he finds them ready.
You may be quite sure of this, that if the householder had known at what hour the burglar would come, he would not have let anyone break through the wall of his house. You too must stand ready, because the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.’
Reflection
Friends, it was in August of 2006, that the late poet Seamus Heaney suddenly fell ill at a friend’s house in Donegal. He had suffered a stroke. He said of it later, “I cried, and I cried…and I wanted my daddy. I felt babyish.” But besides fear, the ordeal also prompted a fresh surge of love for his wife, Marie. While in the ambulance taking him to hospital in Letterkenny, he said his feelings swung between terror and love. “The trip in the ambulance I always remember because Marie was in the back with me. To me, that was one of the actual beauties of the stroke, that renewal of love in the ambulance. One of the strongest, sweetest memories I have. We went through Glendorn on a very beautiful, long, bumpy ride to Letterkenny hospital.”
However, while convalescing later, he wrote a poem titled: ‘Had I not been awake’. The opening line says: ‘Had I not been awake I would have missed it.’ The ‘it’ in question was an unexpected gust of wind swirling round his house and which fired leaves from a nearby sycamore tree at the roof, hitting it with great clatter. For Heaney, this common stirring of nature was a gifted moment in his life; one that could easily have passed him by. That simple racket of the natural world sounded to him like a symphony, awaking within him the wonder and possibility of life. That moment passed quickly but it was pivotal to his recovery from the stroke. It was an experience that lifted him up, as he wrote, all ‘a-patter’ and it energised him to continue living his life with love and not fear.
‘Had I not been awake, I would have missed it.’
Last weekend, in our Gospel, Jesus issued His disciples, delivered us all a wake-up call, asking us to work at and to treasure the things of life that are truly important and not to be consumed by the nonsense that can sometimes distract us. This Sunday, having woken us to the important aspects of our lives, Jesus now calls upon us to stay awake – to be “dressed for action, to have our lamps lit”.
Simply put, we are being asked to pay attention, to be alert, to be ready. We are being asked not to let life pass us by. There is something wonderful in store for each of us every day, but we need to awaken our senses to perceive and receive God’s gift. Too easily we can slumber through life and miss God’s electrifying presence in our lives and all that He envisages for us. We can often settle for the ordinary, when God has something much more ambitious in store for us. There is plenty that should set our lives all ‘a -patter’ and make us live with love and hope, more than with fear and despair.
We are invited to recognize that Christ comes to us every day — in the Eucharist, in our families, in friends and neighbours, in the poor, neglected, and suffering, in the loud and rare quiet moments of life. But are we awake, are we attentive enough to notice Him?
This challenge to alertness, to awareness, is not one given to keep us all in fear, but to allow us live in hope. Like children waiting for Christmas morning, or a family awaiting the return of a loved one — we watch, we stay alert, because we know something wonderful is coming. The Lord’s return is the same. It is not a threat, but a promise of love, mercy, justice, and eternal joy.
So, let us hear the voice and call of Jesus today, and follow it. Let us be ready in prayer, awake in love, and alert in hope. The Lord is nearer than we think but “blessed are those whom the Master finds awake when He comes.”
‘Had I not been awake I would have missed it.’
Fr. Richard
