”Go out, therefore, into the main roads and invite to the feast whomever you find”…..”I will give you a new heart and place a new spirit within you”

 

Today at Holy Mass we hear from the gospel of St Matthew…..Jesus talks about “a big party” and everyone is invited…But here is the weird thing…The people who were supposed to show up…Do not show…So what does the guy do who was throwing the party?…He tells his friends to go out into the streets and invite anyone and everyone you see…Oddly enough, the people who come to the party are the people many of the “chosen people” originally invited wrote off…..Interesting!?!……This is something for us to ponder today….God works in mysterious ways and many times its the very people the world “writes off”…These are the people that come through in the end….So never write off anyone…And invite everyone to the “party”!…Jesus did…And Jesus still does to this very day

What is it that keeps people from following Christ?…..Well many things…Wounds…..Unconfessed sin…..Broken promises from parents…A false sense of hopelessness….We can go on and on….In the first reading today at Mass the Prophet Ezekiel addresses this directly….”I will give you a new heart and place a new spirit within you, taking from your bodies your stony hearts and giving you natural hearts. I will put my spirit within you and make you live by my statutes”…..God understands us in ways the world can never understand us….If only we give him a chance…..Miracles can happen…In fact they do happen!

“I will sprinkle clean water upon you to cleanse you from all your impurities”

Addressing someone who is “invisible” is empowering…It gives life and open doors….This week at work I was getting a cup of tea in the afternoon and one of the workers on my floor was stocking the pantry…There was no brown sugar, so I asked him if he had any. He told me no….Instead of leaving the conversation there I introduced myself to him and shook his hand. He told me his name was John and it was his first day on the job. After our brief conversation I went back to my desk. A few minutes later, John came looking for me and brought me the sugar I asked for…I was rather surprised and I shook his hand again and thanked him…I addressed him by name..."Thank you John".......John was not “invisible" to me on the 21st floor of my office building…John is a person…John has a family…And John is a child of God…All it took was to acknowledge him…Shake his hand…Ask him his name……And guess what?…John responded…..This is what God does…He “sees” us…And because God does this for us…So must we do this for our neighbor…Most especially to those who the world chooses to ignore....Who are "invisible"

“Then the king said to his servants, “The feast is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy to come. Go out, therefore, into the main roads and invite to the feast whomever you find.” The servants went out into the streets”

In order to have “eyes to see” we must open our hearts to God’s grace…..Jesus used 12 uneducated working class men to change the world….We need to stop “sizing up” people!……Give people a chance….Extend a hand…..Offer a kind word…Give away a smile…..Sometimes that is all it takes…..And many times its the people who were “supposed to come to the party”, they are the ones that don’t show up…But its the one who many wrote off…Who was “invisible”…That is the one who “shows up”…If only we give people a chance?

”Go out, therefore, into the main roads and invite to the feast whomever you find”…..”I will give you a new heart and place a new spirit within you”