21st Sunday in Ordinary Time 2022 C
INTRO: When I began to reflect on this Gospel, the haunting phrase for me was:
“I do not know where you are from”
I would say I was a bit shocked.
Have you ever met someone casually talking to them, on an airplane sitting next to you, or have had a server waiting on you in a restaurant and they have a certain “dialect” in their speech, and you are thinking …. “Where is this person from?”
Sometimes you may ASK THEM directly or NOT. It does not really matter if you do or do not. Obviously, if you have had that experience, you realize that not everyone is from the same place.
Not everyone is from the same place!
Hmmmm ….??? And Jesus says,
“I do not know where you are from?”
Let us put that together tonight and unpack this Gospel story.
This story is all about our eternal salvation, our gift of heaven after our time on earth.
And you all know the great LOVE God has for us and how He wants us to be with Him in eternal life in Paradise. Remember, He created us with free will in His image and likeness to live to love and to serve. Please do not forget that!
With that said and done, here is the point of God saying
“I do not know where you are from!”
We are followers of Jesus, we are followers of His ways, and we are followers of our Catholic religion.
Unfortunately, some of us, even going back to the Apostolic times, PICK AND CHOOSE, with our free will, what to follow in our religion and what not to follow!
Many cannot embrace all the rules, laws, and teachings, that the Catholic Church espouses and so they refuse to even try to do so.
Trying to try to do so, is good and beneficial to one’s eternal life, but refusing to do so and cutting out that rule or rules in your life as if it or they do not matter, places you in that position for God to say,
“I do not know where you are from!”
So, going back to the Gospel story who then will be saved?
CONCLUSION:
YOU WILL be saved when you follow and or try to follow all that the church places in our life.
When it comes down to being a good Christian and Catholic, we must make sure that we are following the path of goodness and life that JESUS has taught us, and our Catholic Church has given us!