A CARPENTER’S WORKSHOP
What do you
make of this? ‘Those with wives should live as though they had none.’ St Paul
seems to be casting a shadow over married life (1 Cor 7: 29)! Yet the context
tells us something else. His theme is ‘our time is growing short.’ We do not
have much time. He is talking of having the perspective of us living a
provisional life. We are not to live as though this life is everything.
True, we
are called to live this live fully; to develop all our gifts, to enjoy using
them, to enter fully into our relationships. But all these are not the whole
story. We are to be like sailors with their eyes on the seemingly endless horizon,
aware that there is another shore that will be revealed. No matter how
satisfying our relationships and our activities, they are not the full story.
We are made for something else.
There is a
story, an amusing story, about Jonah and the whale. He runs away from the task
he has been set and gets swallowed by a big fish. Surviving that, he has second
thoughts and takes up the task and warms the Ninevites they have only 40 days
left. Oddly, they believe him and every man, woman and beast begin to change
their way of life. They respond to the bigger picture Jonah, the unlikely
prophet, presents to them.
Coming to
Jesus’ time, we have the story of him calling Peter and his companions. They
too, like the Ninevites, ‘immediately’ – the word is used eleven times in Mark
1 – change their way of life. Nothing wrong with fishing. It’s a hard life but
a rewarding one too if you succeed in catching fish. But Jesus says, ‘I have
something bigger for you.’ There and then they drop everything and follow him.
Surely, they should have taken time to consider the job offer? But no, they act
immediately.
There was
something about Jesus that was overwhelmingly attractive. Once they grasped it,
they acted. And the early Church found it contagious and were full of
expectation that the Lord would soon return. Everything else was provisional,
precarious and a ‘valley of tears.’
We come to
our own time. We are absorbed by our problems, our unease, our tears. The news
is relentlessly horrible. We see no end to our wars and our problems – global,
local and personal. Yet the gospel invites us to live with a deeper
perspective. We cannot brush away our worries. But we can expand our vision to
see the fuller picture. Our world is provisional – like a carpenter’s workshop.
What you see is not the whole picture. A future is being fashioned that we can
only imagine. 21
January 2024 Sunday 3B Jon 3:1-10 1
Cor 7:29-31 Mk 1:14-20
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