08 July 2023 – 14th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A) (Sunset Mass)

by Fr Joachim Robert

Dear friends

Today our readings reminds us on our walk towards holiness. And as we journey towards holiness, the obstacles and challenges that comes along the way invites us to put our faith and trust in this God who calls us to Himself. He says:

Come to me all you who labour and are overburdened and I will give you rest. Shoulder my yoke and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your soul. Yes, my yoke is easy and my burden light.

So as we embark on this reflection, dear friends, this time that we see where we as Christian disciples walk in our journey of faith, we are called to take a deep look at ourselves. And in this journey that we are taking, are we weary? Are we troubled? Are we tired? Are we overburdened? Because when we allow our weariness, our tiredness, our obstacles and challenges to dampen our spirit, then we know that we are distracted, that we are distracted from what the Lord wants of us. Because if we are faithful to what the Lord invites us into, it must lead us to a greater joy to find the fulfillment of life that God gives to us.

So I ask you once again: Are you troubled? Are you tired? Are you overburdened? Perhaps let us take this time to listen to our hearts, to see where are we in that relationship. As we take this time to listen, dear friends, let us acknowledge the emotions and perhaps how we are feeling before we process.

Very often we do not enter into that space of our hearts to listen carefully to what the Lord is speaking and allowing us to experience. And we often operate from our minds, the level of our head. And we think of so many things because our thinking affects the way we feel. And the way we feel affects how we experience in our hearts. And as we allow ourselves to quieten down, to come to the level of the heart, we also must allow that experience of the hearts to inform our minds. And that requires listening, that require us to place ourselves into that providence of God.

And the first thing, dear friends, that we need to be reminded is to put our faith and trust in this God who comes to us in those situations and leads us to move forward.

And today I would like to look at three things or three images because today, this morning, while I was preparing the homily for the past week, these three images captured my mind, as I was talking to another person.

The first image is the image of a man or a woman with a suitcase, trying to go quickly, hurriedly to where they want to go.

And the second image that comes to mind is the image of a person sweeping, a janitor sweeping the floor.

And the third thing is the image of an alarm clock. I am sure each one of you have an alarm clock to wake up in the morning.

So let me look at these three images: a man carrying a suitcase, a man or a janitor sweeping and the image of the alarm.

So very often when we look at the situations of our lives, we are hurried to do so many things in our lives. We think and think and think to the extent that we allow ourselves to lose sight, to lose control and often we find ourselves losing our sleep because we want to hurry and go where we want to go. And sometimes, dear friends, this thinking, this worrying and perhaps when we dwell in our regrets, makes us unable to sleep, make us being resentful and perhaps being anxious in where we want to go. But the same image of that restlessness, and the same image of being unable to come to the level of the heart is also to be hurried to go where God invites us to do. Or He invites us to go. Because that opportunity that God, gives to us, dear friends, gives us the opportunity to come to be light-hearted, to carry things light and go towards our mission to where God wants of us. And for that we just need to be faithful to what the Lord wants of us. And very often we spend our time thinking and thinking and thinking to the extent that we lose our sleep, we lose our comfort, lose our peace because we want to do things our way. And for that, we need to know that we need to travel light.

And the second thing, dear friends, that we need to do is the image of the janitor, the one who was sweeping. And very often when we allow ourselves to be burdened, hurting with so many baggages of life, we come to this situation where we allow our anger, our experiences of the past brewed in anger and resentment and it drains so much of our energy because we are not willing to let go. And the image of the janitor invites us to let go, to allow forgiveness to take its place and to allow that experiences to past. And for that, dear friends, we need to surrender. We need to surrender and we need to forgive. Because all those burdens that comes along the way will not take us far. It will only cripple us, will only hold us rather than moving forward.

And I come back to the first image again. We are unable to go far because our baggages are heavy. Our baggages are heavy because we allow ourselves to be drained down with emotions, we allow ourselves to be pinned down with these experiences of the past and we don’t want the Lord to take control.

The Lord invites us to trust, to surrender and to forgive.

And the third thing, dear friends, is the image of the alarm clock. Very often when we have the image of the alarm clock is that of someone who is disciplined, who wants to get up at a certain point in time. Particularly, when you set your alarm clock, you want to have some form of discipline in your life so that you want to get up at a certain time. And for that, dear friends, sometimes when we get up late, we are anxious, we get panicked, and we go and do many, many things to fill that time. And sometimes in those situations, we overreact. And when we overreact, we are unable to see things clearly because we panic and we are anxious. And because we do that, we are unable to see things with a bigger perspective of life.

And here too we are called to move from overreacting to be humble before God and to trust that even in those circumstances and situations of life, that God is in control. So we need to move from overreaction towards a humility of heart, understanding where the Lord wants to lead us. And again as Saint Paul tells us, in the letter of Saint Paul to the Romans, the Second Reading today, we must be people who are interested in our spiritual things. Things that lead us towards holiness, things that lead us towards relationship of an encounter deep in God. And if we allow that relationship to grow, then we will focus on this holiness of life, of the spirit of God that is dwelling in us. And each time we move towards God, each time we learn from that journey of being overburdened, to relationship of trusts, when we move from hurting to forgiveness or to surrender, and we move to overreaction to this humility of heart, we allow the Lord to lead us into the journey of His heart. And when we are able to enter into that heart of God, we can resonate. And for that, dear friends, we must enter from the head into our hearts so that we are able to experience His depth of love, His faithfulness, His providence and His steadfastness in where He is calling us to do or where He is calling us into.

And let us pray, dear friends, that if we are tried in this journey of life, if we are tired in this journey that we are taking to lead this holiness of life that God promises us, let us turn to the Gospel of today and be reminded that even in those hidden moments, the Lord is speaking to us. And he says:

Come to me all who labour and are overburdened and I will give you rest. Shoulder my yoke and learn from me for I am gentle and be humble in heart and you will find rest for your soul. Yes, my yoke is easy and my burden light.

Let us learn to trust the Lord, dear friends. Let us allow ourselves to surrender and forgive and let us also walk in humility of heart and mind to allow the Lord to reign in our heart so that we are able to walk in that path of holiness where the Lord is leading us.

Click below to listen to homily and watch video:-

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