2024/10/27 SCRIPTURE REFLECTION
Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time
- Leo Rubinkowski, Manager of Events & Ministry Engagement
“Shout with joy for Jacob…” — Jeremiah 31:7
It’s strange to read Scripture knowing that there is a lens through which the Gospel is refracted, a point of view that doesn’t necessarily obscure or misrepresent, but which throws certain themes into crisper focus than others. For yours truly, we might call that lens belonging—who’s close and who’s distant—so this Sunday’s readings, about crowds, processions, nations, and families seem to have walked up to me, put their collective finger to my chest, and said “Pay attention.”
“Shout with joy for Jacob,” God instructs His afflicted, fallen, besieged, exiled, and seemingly abandoned people; “exult at the head of the nations.” Right there, in the first words of the first reading, belonging looms. Shout with joy for this people, chosen in all the world, whom the Lord will gather again as His singular possession, rescuing them from other nations. Israel will be restored, and their exaltation will be cause for remark by others (Psalm 126:2).
As the crowd leaves Jericho at the beginning of the Gospel reading, Bartimaeus is among those others. Unless we expect the Lord announced Himself as He passed, this blind man heard the crowd first (Luke 18:36) and learned from them Who was passing. He begs for pity, asks for sight, receives healing, and by the end of the account, Bartimaeus has joined the “immense throng.”
I don’t mean to minimize the import of this example by such a slight summary; it's impossible to overlook Bartimaeus, because we ought to feel his example daily. Like Israel and Judah led away in exile, how often is life cause for weeping? How far does sin remove us from our Father Who desires to console us? And when we feel we are Bartimaeus—begging and blind—we should do like Bartimaeus and cry out. Bartimaeus is not where my focus lands, though, and it’s not where I’d like to direct your focus just now.
To be frank, I don’t find myself feeling far from God at this moment in my life. I am immensely blessed in that, and I know not everyone enjoys this feeling. (If you don’t feel close to God, I am praying for you—you!) Nevertheless, although I recognize how much I am like Bartimaeus, I feel more a member of the crowd already following Jesus, and that turns out to be where I feel rightly put on the spot this Sunday.
“Shout with joy for Jacob,” whom the Father has claimed, and through whom the Father claims all nations (Genesis 12:2-3; Genesis 28:14-15; Isaiah 56:3-8). Israel’s glory, the fulfillment of God’s promise (Luke 2:32), is our in-gathering, too! Good! Yes! We belong! You and I are we! And if others hear our rejoicing or see our lives changed by the Gospel? If others see and hear us in the crowd gathered about the High Priest? This moment is what quiets me: “And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent…” Just then, were those individuals, the ones discouraging Bartimaeus, really part of the crowd following Christ?
When I introduced belonging, I described it as a question of proximity, rather than a simple division between in and out. That’s because however close to or far from Jesus I am, I want to be closer. If I’m separated, I want to be rejoined; if I am following Him, I want to follow better; if I love Him, I want to love more fully. For that reason, it saddens me, even scares me, to remember the ways I have put distance between us in the past and to know that I will do so again, even when I am part of the rejoicing throng.
I wish I were more capable of writing this reflection, but I hope you catch my drift. This Sunday, the valleys and heights of belonging—to Jacob, the chosen people; to the rejoicing remnant carrying their sheaves; to the priestly people led by our High Priest; to Christ—are mapped in astonishing detail, so that even as we recognize the great gift of being called, we see how easy it is to misunderstand that call, especially by becoming an obstacle to others we are surprised to find called alongside us.
As I think over it, how much more shocked should I be that I have ever wanted to stand between someone else and Our Lord! That I, among all people, am not excluded from His compassion should be evidence enough that His mercy excludes no one. Thanks be to God!