HOMILY FOR THE 22ND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (YEAR A)
Rev. Fr. Ezekoka Peter Onyekachi
Jeremiah 20:7-9 Romans 12:1-2 Matthew 16:21-27
Fraser and Hamish were walking side by side with one another, bearing heavy crosses. As they walked along, the burden of Hamish’s cross weighed heavily upon him. Sore and sweating, eventually he cried out: Dear God, this cross is so heavy for me. Please will you cut a bit off the vertical beam? God obliged him and did what he asked. Going a little further, and still feeling the cross weighing heavily upon him, Hamish begged God a second time for help. Dear God, this cross is so heavy for me. Please will you cut a bit off the left-hand side of the horizontal beam? God obliged him and did what he asked. Hamish was still struggling, so he begged God a third time for help, and the right-hand side of the horizontal beam was reduced as well. Eventually, Fraser and Hamish reached a deep gorge where it was impossible for them to go on unless they slid their crosses across a narrow gap and used them as bridges. Fraser simply slipped his cross over the gorge and got to the other side. Hamish, however, was stuck. His cross has been so foreshortened that it was unable to bridge the gap. This time Hamish yelled to God: Dear God, Please help me. Give me back those parts of my cross that were chopped off, so that I can bridge the gap with my original cross and get to the other side with Fraser. Well, he wanted to have had his cake and eat it. In His kindness, God gave him another chance. The condition was that Hamish should go back to where the chopped-off pieces lay, pick them up and nail them on again, and come back to cross the gorge. Hamish wept with regret: Had I known that all those pieces were needed, I wouldn’t have complained. Hamish realized that he would have to expend more time and more energy fixing and bearing the cross, than he would have done had he borne the whole burden from the start. The cross each one of us has to bear for Christ’s sake is necessary, indeed essential, to enable us to cross over safely to eternal life with God. Yes, what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.
In the Gospel, Our Lord revealed to His disciples the condition for discipleship. This happened after the confession of Peter at Caesarea Philippi when Jesus explained to His disciples how the Son of Man will suffer grievously, be killed, and be raised on the third day. As the spokesman of the disciples and as the first Pope, Peter took Jesus aside and declared that the disciples would not allow suffering and dying to happen to Him. Peter was not aware that the Cross of Christ was the weapon to effect our crossover from sin to grace, from damnation to salvation, from hatred to love, from strife to peace, from slavery to freedom, from tears to joy, and from sorrow to gladness. But Peter hadn’t listened to the rest of Jesus’ words, had he? He’d missed the bit about Jesus being raised from the dead! Where the Holy Spirit had inspired Peter to confess Jesus as the Christ, the Son of the living God just moments previously, Satan immediately stepped in to delude Peter about the purpose of Jesus’ mission. It was Satan whom Jesus rebuked strongly: ύπαγε όπισω μον, σατανα. Jesus didn’t say “Get behind me, Peter”; He said, “Get behind me, Satan!” Our Lord then said to His disciples: whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross and follow Me. Everybody has a cross, not just us. When we deny ourselves, we look to Christ and accept the realities of existence. It is in giving our all for Him, in expending our blood, sweat and tears, that we actually grow in the Christian life. Christ was perfected through suffering (Heb 2:10). Following the Lord, carrying our crosses and helping others to bear theirs, is the route that leads us to the glory of heaven.
In the First Reading, Jeremiah’s prophetic ministry foreshadows the burden of the cross. He felt wounded by the derision his message of repentance evoked, and he complained that he was ‘an object of laughter’. He also acknowledged, however, that: you have seduced me Lord and I have allowed myself to be seduced. God had overpowered him with His overwhelming love for him, and the message that Jeremiah proclaimed was a cross he was called by God to bear. As St. Paul declares in the Second Reading, the message of the cross enables us to offer our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God.
Like us, St Peter and the Prophet Jeremiah without realizing at their various moments of encounter with the Lord how earthly pain would ultimately lead them to heavenly glory felt the common, human urge to argue with God. Don’t we occasionally feel like arguing with the Lord? Don’t we sometimes feel like upbraiding God about how He has permitted a particular situation to develop in our lives? Don’t we feel tempted to ask God where He is when bad stuff happens to us? Feelings can be unreliable, though, can’t they? The temptation to quiz God on His motives will come, but it can be overcome by reminding ourselves of these words of Our Lord: anyone who loses his life for My sake will find it. That cross you bear for the sake of Christ - the one that is causing you excruciating pain in your life - is actually the bridge to victory over death and glory in heaven. Remember that what we selfishly hold onto, we lose, but what we give away, we preserve. Nothing is safe until it is in the hands of God, and nothing lasts unless it is preserved by God. May God continue to help us to grow in grace and lead us ultimately to heaven. Amen. God bless you.
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