Mass readings for the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time:
Isaiah 8:23-9:3
Psalm 27:1, 4, 13-14
1 Corinthians 1:10-13, 17
Matthew 4:12-23 or Matthew 4:12-17
It’s helpful still to take a step back and see the bigger picture, to understand what the Church has been trying to teach us these past several months. For I believe there is indeed a message.
In Advent, we sought Christ. At Christmas and at the Epiphany we adored the Incarnation and contemplated the Lord’s universal sovereignty. The past two Sundays, in the two different accounts of Jesus’s baptism in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of John, we reflected on the sacramental closeness of that which we’ve all been seeking and celebrating these past few months – that is, Christ the Lord.
And now we come to Ordinary Time but notice how it begins. With a story about the calling of the disciples.
Having overcome the devil’s desert temptation, Jesus begins his ministry in Galilee, fulfilling Isaiah’s prophecy. “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” Jesus says (Matthew 4:17). This is what it means to bring light to the people, to tell them to turn away from darkness.
But then, almost instantly it seems, Jesus calls Peter and Andrew and James and John, the sons of Zebedee. They don’t seek a master; rather, the Master seeks them. And the Master is compelling, persuasive, and beautiful. “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men,” the Master Jesus says to them (Matthew 4:19). And immediately, they drop everything and follow him.
They leave their nets; James and John even leave their father behind. Jesus has called them, and they have left the world; that’s what that means, all that leaving of livelihood and family. Being a disciple of Jesus is not something you can do on the side. Being a Christian is not a part time job. I mean, what on earth did you celebrate Christmas for? What on earth would Christmas mean if you refused to be a disciple?
Again, I believe that there’s a message here. It’s as if the Church, Sunday by Sunday, has been drawing us from anticipation to contemplation to sacrament to discipleship. Now, after all that we’ve celebrated in mystery, we are called. This Christ, born for us and worshipped by the Magi, is now the same Lord calling us to follow him. Now together we pivot from the crèche to Calvary, from Galilee to Jerusalem. Now Christ is calling us to be fishers of men and women, making disciples of everyone we know.
And so, what was demanded of those first disciples is demanded of us. We are to leave the world behind immediately. If not literally, although some are indeed thus called, we are called to leave our jobs insofar as we now offer our work to the Lord for his kingdom and his glory, no longer just ours. If we’re not called to leave our families, although some indeed are thus called, we are called to love the Lord first, before even those dearest to us. Spouses should love Jesus more than they love each other; parents should love Jesus more than they love their children; friends should love Jesus more than they love each other.
Now that sounds odd, I get it, but that’s the only way we can love our spouses and our children and our friends properly, by loving their souls and loving what God wants for them more than anything else. This is what the love of disciples looks like; it is centered and anchored in our love of Christ above all else, love perfected in obedience. That’s what leaving things may look like in your life, like truly loving Jesus above all else.
This Sunday, then, is a Sunday for us to be resolved. Imagine this Sunday that Christ is calling you, for he is indeed calling you. Put yourself there by the Sea of Galilee and imagine that this Christ we’ve been celebrating, contemplating his birth and baptism, is now calling you. He calls you by name and asks you to follow. How will you answer? What are you willing to let go of? What will you hold on to? What do you refuse to let go of? What do you value more than Christ?
These are the pressing questions put to each disciple, to you and me. As we begin this journey toward Lent and Jerusalem, this is what we should ask ourselves. Will we drop everything? Does Jesus mean that much?
Father Joshua J. Whitfield is pastor of St. Rita Catholic Community in Dallas and author of “The Crisis of Bad Preaching” (Ave Maria Press, $17.95) and other books.
