25 August 2024 – 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

by Fr Joachim Robert

Dear brothers and sisters,

In our every day walk of life, we are confronted with many choices or decisions in life. And those choices and decisions that we make, whether big or small, makes us realise of where we want to go or where we don’t want to go.

And sometimes when we make decisions, there are consequences to our decisions as well. Good decisions makes us grow in freedom, flourish and also good decisions make us grow more and more in union with God.

And our decisions, good or bad, has consequences as well. And these consequences affect not only us but also the people around us.

If someone decides to become the best of what God has willed for them, then that giftedness, that goodness, that charity that comes from within is shared to the people around us. And if we choose to be selfish, then those choices that we make also affects the people around us, our families, our communities and many more people.

But in this situation, dear friends, as we look at the First Reading of today from the book of Joshua, they are out of the land of Egypt after 40 years being in the wilderness, now they come to this Promised Land. And there Joshua tells everyone and he says: 
If you will not serve the Lord, choose today whom you wish to serve, whether the Gods of your ancestors served beyond the river or the Gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living now. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

This is the choice that Joshua makes for himself and for his family. And when he makes this choice, dear friends, we see that he takes a look back of his whole journey of how the people of Israel was led out from the land of Egypt, going through the wilderness and now with a heart of gratitude he wants to make this commitment before God and say:
We want to follow God.

And his decision as well also affected his family And later at the end of the Reading of today, you see the whole community, as well as those who wanted to follow him, chose to follow God as well.

So the choice of Joshua affects not only himself but the whole of the people together. And when we remember, dear friends, before we make choices, before we make decisions, before we embark on a new path forward, we need to remember. And remembrance must come with a heart of gratitude.

Pope Francis used to say that gratitude is the memory of the heart. And if we acknowledge the goodness of God, the blessings of God and the faithfulness of God in our lives, with that assurance, with that gratitude of heart that we have, we will be more convicted, we will grow more in our faith to surrender ourselves to the path that God leads us.

Joshua was not sure what was before him. He was uncertain but he put his faith and trust in God. 

And sometimes, whenever you make this decisions as such, the consequences are great. Sometimes we feel tired, we feel disillusioned, we feel that it is too much to carry or too overwhelming.

But because of the choice that he has made, acknowledging God’s blessing, acknowledging God’s giftedness in his life, throughout his life he is able to make that choice moving forward. And he did that with his obedience of faith.

If you take a look at Saint John’s Gospel today, here too we see the consequences of choices. Here as we look at the Gospel, it comes to a conclusion of the Bread of Life discourse that we have been reading for the past few weeks, where Jesus is the bread come down from heaven. And there were people following Him when He worked miracles, when He worked wonders and after the multiplication of loaves, many people followed Him too.

But after that, as we come to today’s Reading, after hearing His doctrine, many of the followers of Jesus said:
This is intolerable language. How could anyone accept it?

When we follow Jesus, dear friends, sometimes the demand that is put before us, sometimes when we allow ourselves to follow the path that God has for us, it demands some sacrifices on our part, some things that we like we have to say ‘No’ and sometimes also takes a toll on us. But when that choices come, when the consequences of our decisions has been made, we have to remember of how God has led us forward. 

Again, going back like the First Reading, like Joshua, we have to remember with that gratitude. We need to allow those moments of gratefulness to move our hearts and to take that step forward in hope even with the  uncertainties that is before us, and say ‘Yes’ to Jesus.

If it is difficult and if it is challenging, like the disciples or the followers of Jesus in today’s Gospel, they were unable to understand, as Jesus says:
Unless you eat this bread which is my body and drink my blood, you will not have life in you.

And Jesus today, when He puts that difficult question to them, they were disillusioned and it required them to make that assent of faith and say ‘Yes’ and move forward.

As the Gospel expresses, many of them left Jesus but Simon Peter, when Jesus said to the 12: What about you? Do you want to go away too?, Simon Peter answered:
Lord, who shall we go to? You have the message of eternal life. We believe, we know that you are the Holy One of God.

Here Simon Peter is speaking for himself and on behalf of the disciples. The choices that he made also affected his disciples or the followers of Jesus too.

These 2 stories, dear friends, the First Reading from Joshua and the Gospel of John today resonates with us because each one of us have this experience of how God has been there for us. And we too have this experience of how we have been led astray sometimes, how we know the truth of faith, how we know what God has blessed us with but we choose to walk away.

Today, like Simon Peter, let us ask the Lord to take us a step further and to recognise Jesus present in the Eucharist. In our difficulties and challenges of life, dear friends, we must allow the Lord to comfort and nourish us and to walk together with us.

And one of the experiences while preparing for this homily was that my experiences in Rome recently. Sometimes whenever there were difficulties that was around me, the food was not too bad, the studies was challenging, the sense of belonging or perhaps speaking the language was difficult, but whenever you were confronted with that kind of situation, what would you do?

And sometimes you feel homesick, thinking ‘Now it is 6 months, then 5 months, then 4 months, 3 months and 1 more month before I come back‘. So these are situations that we have to struggle with in each and every moments of our lives whenever we make a choice. When it was asked for me to go, I went and these are the consequences of having to go through those challenges. But what helped me was that daily Eucharist. What has helped me in that whole journey throughout the whole 6 months was day in and day out celebrating the Eucharist, asking the Lord to give me the strength to persevere and move forward.

And as I look back, now since I have finished and I have come back, after looking back, I am amazed of how I have moved forward. I am amazed of how God has been there with me in those moments. And those moments of difficulty now becomes a memory that is etched in my heart with a heart of gratitude. Because as the Responsorial Psalm says today: Taste and see the Lord is good.

And when we are able to taste and see the beauty of God, the goodness of God in our life, then we allow the Lord to nourish us in the Eucharist and to move forward with whatever uncertainties that is there before us and take that step forward in faith.

So let us pray, dear friends, that we may grow in that awareness of God’s love for us, that God will sustain us, God is faithful in our lives every step along the way. And for the grace of this openness of heart, for the grace of embracing Jesus present in the Eucharist, we ask the Lord to inspire us to have that understanding of faith like Simon Peter to say:
You have the message of eternal life. We believe, we know you are the Holy One of God.

Let us make that assent of faith and let that be our pray.

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