CLICK FOR FREE CATALOG OF AUDIO COURSES
PLAY SAMPLE OF AUDIO COURSE
Blog Author: Fr. John Jay Hughes
Related Audio Course: A Journey Through the Parables
“IT IS LOVE THAT I DESIRE, NOT SACRIFICE.”
Tenth Sunday of Year A. Hos. 6:3-6; Rom. 4:18-25; Mt. 9:9-13.
AIM: To show that our efforts to obey God’s law are a response to God’s love, not its precondition.
Is it all right to miss Sunday Mass as long as you lead a good life? What about people who are regular at Mass, yet selfish, mean, and impossible to live with the rest of the week? Finally, what about people who have given up both churchgoing and all effort to lead good lives? Does God love people like that? Today’s readings touch all these questions.
The first reading is about people who are pious on Sunday, but anything but pious the rest of the week. “Your piety is like a morning cloud,” the prophet Hosea tells them, “like the dew that early passes away.” God does not accept worship and acts of piety which have no consequences in daily life: “It is love I desire, not sacrifice, and knowledge of God rather than holocausts.” Translated into modern Catholic terms, that might be: “It is love I desire, not long prayers; and knowledge of God rather than Masses, rosaries, and novenas.”
The “knowledge” Hosea is talking about is not just in the head. It involves the heart as well. It is the personal knowledge we have of someone we love dearly and intimately. It includes loyalty to the one we know through love. When Hosea represents God saying, “It is love I desire, not sacrifice,” he is not condemning acts of worship. He is stating priorities. God does desire our worship. And God accepts our worship — but only if it is supported by a good life.
In our second reading Paul gives us an example of someone who had the intimate knowledge of God, based on love, that Hosea is talking about. Abraham’s trust in God was so firm that “he did not doubt God’s promise” that he and his childless wife Sarah, both far too old to have children, would become, through their descendants, the parents “of many nations.” Abraham knew that, humanly speaking, such a thing was impossible. He trusted, however, that God could do for him what he, Abraham, could never do himself.
The gospel reading shows us Jesus doing just that: the humanly impossible. In Matthew, the tax collector, we see someone who has abandoned not only religious practice but all attempt to lead a good life. Matthew is an outcast: despised by all decent people because he works for the hated Roman government of occupation; and because, in collecting taxes for them, he enriches himself with all kind of shakedowns and protection rackets.
Yet Jesus actually calls this despised outcast to be his disciple! Worse, he even goes to dinner in Matthew’s house — where there is no attempt to keep the Jewish dietary laws; and where Jesus is sure to meet people every bit as disreputable as his host. No wonder Jesus’ critics ask his disciples: “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
Jesus answers this question by quoting Hosea’s words from our first reading: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” Jesus’ critics were meticulous about sacrifice. They performed all their religious obligations faithfully. Hence they cannot understand Jesus’ presence in the house of a man who ignored every obligation — to God, and to his fellow human beings as well. Jesus called Matthew to discipleship, and ate in his house, to give him an example of the mercy and love which God wants from us before all else. Jesus’ critics thought he was approving Matthew’s godless life. In reality he was calling Matthew away from that life. He does so, however, not by condemnation or moral exhortation, but by reaching out to Matthew in mercy and love.
Through Jesus Matthew experiences God as Abraham experienced him: as the God of the impossible; who could do for him what Matthew could never do for himself. Matthew is entangled in a vicious circle of corruption and greed. To break free, he needs a power greater than his own, to lift him from the swamp in which he is mired. Jesus’ invitation, “Follow me,” is like a lifeline thrown to a drowning man.
Had Jesus waited for Matthew to show some sign of repentance that could make Matthew “deserving” of help, he might have waited forever. So Jesus does for this despised outcast what Matthew is incapable of doing for himself. Matthew’s abandonment of his sinful life is the consequence of the mercy Jesus shows him. It is Matthew’s response to God’s love, not the precondition by which Matthew earns that love.
Matthew’s story is, in heightened and dramatic form, the story of every one of us. Left to ourselves, our situation is helpless. People in the Alcoholics Anonymous program learn that the crucial step to recovery is saying: “We came to admit that we were powerless over alcohol; that only a power greater than our own could restore us to sanity.” That sentence is at the heart of the gospel. Each of us has some inner demon, threatening to drag us down. Until we admit that only a power greater than our own can save us, we can never break free. We cannot win the battle on our own: not by willpower, however strong; not by all the prayers and sacrifices in the world, not matter how sincere and fervent.
The good news of the gospel is that God does not leave us on our own. He does not wait for some proof that we “deserve” his mercy and love. God does for us what we can never do for ourselves. He sent his Son to pay the price of our sins. He gives us his Holy Spirit to liberate us from whatever inner demons threaten to drag us down.
When Matthew followed Jesus’ call, “Follow me,” his life was changed forever. Later Jesus would make this outcast not only a disciple but an apostle: a person sent to others with the same message of mercy and love that had changed Matthew’s own life. God never calls anyone for himself or herself alone. He calls us so that through us he may call others.
That is why we are here: to receive once again, in word and sacrament, the mercy and love of our generous and loving God; to be so full of God’s mercy and love that they overflow from us onto others. You may not see yourself as God’s messenger. God does. He remains today, as always, the God of the impossible. He wants to accomplish the impossible in your life — and through you for others. Today, in this hour, Jesus is saying to you in tender love, just as he said to Matthew: “Follow me.” He is waiting for your response — right now.