Monday of the
First Week in Ordinary Time
(I Samuel 1:1-18; Mark 1:14-20)
Many rabbis in ancient Israel had disciples. But none treated their disciples like Jesus
did his. Other rabbis received students
who came to them for instruction. Jesus
went out to seek his disciples as today’s gospel shows. The duty of other rabbis was to teach their
disciples the law. Jesus, however, has
another purpose – to make his disciples fishers
or gatherers of people. Other rabbis had
their disciples serve them; Jesus, on the other hand, came “to serve, not to be
served.”
Jesus’s ways are so distinctive because he comes to
proclaim the arrival of God’s Kingdom. He
knows that now is not the time to study God’s law; it is time to embrace the
fulfillment of all that the law promises.
It is the difference between preparing for a feast and sitting down at
table. The people must be moved to give
up prejudice toward other nations and hostility toward one another. They must be shown that God, the Father of
all, calls all to solidarity.
It may seem to some that the moment of the Kingdom has passed,
that we live in post-religious times when the best we can hope for is growing
the world economy so that everyone will have access to the Internet. But this is not so. The Kingdom is still within our grasp because
Jesus is not a mere human whose bones have long rotten. He is the resurrected Lord who always calls
us to greater love.
