Reflection - Marks

http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/011419.cfm
Hebrews 1:1-6
Mark 1:14-20

As the author of Hebrews begins his testimony and teaching, he offers a summary perspective on the Messiah who was promised, a position and mission which Jesus consummately fulfilled.

In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways
to our ancestors through the prophets;
in these last days, he spoke to us through the Son,
whom he made heir of all things
and through whom he created the universe,
who is the refulgence of his glory,
the very imprint of his being,
and who sustains all things by his mighty word.

You might almost think the author was expressing his adoration of a King. And so he was.

It is striking, therefore, that this text is paired with the call of Simon and his brother Andrew as well as James and his brother John. If you’ve ever been to a fresh-fish market you can imagine what the four would have smelled like. You might also get the impression that Jesus was setting off to establish a Kingdom and was inviting these others to join in the journey and its mission. And so he was.

The most remarkable thing about this exchange with those four who would later be called Apostles, was in the promise he made to them: “I will make you fishers of men.” It’s charming to hear him offer this simile, playing off their life’s work, a work in which they were presently engaged. Underlying his call is a very distinct proposition: “I have something better to catch than fish! Want to join me?” But there is an even deeper invite here, one that would only become evident to them in the coming years.

Throughout the centuries before Jesus’ birth, the Jewish people were more and more clearly identified as having a special relationship with God. We most frequently hear it in the phrase “people of God” or “God’s Chosen People” or simply “the Chosen People.” The designation is continued into the New Testament writings. St Peter says to the early Christians:

You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people, that you may declare the wonderful deeds of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. (1Peter 2:9)

And Peter is simply echoing the words God instructed Moses to say to the people he had recently led out of Egyptian slavery.

Over the next several centuries the relationship would become manifestly more familial. The Prophet Hosea was not the only prophet who would spell out the nature of that shift in the relationship; but he did say it quite succinctly. Hosea was writing during the period when the Northern Kingdom would fall — the prey of foreigners. Their destruction was directly due to their failure to live as “the people of God.” In God’s eyes they had become “not my people.” It is in this context that Hosea makes his proclamation:

Yet the number of the people of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea, which can be neither measured nor numbered; and in the place where it was said to them, "You are not my people," it shall be said to them, "Sons of the living God." (Hosea 1:10)

The change is extraordinary! No longer will they be known as “the people of God.” Rather, they will be known as “Sons [and daughters] of the living God. Exactly what Hosea had in mind when he made that statement is worthy of study and discussion. However, there is no question what Paul had in mind in his many restatements of the same thing. The one from Galatians is both simple and clear:

In Christ Jesus you are all sons of God. (Galatians 3:26)

Jesus’ invitation to those four fishermen contained more than just the promise of larger game. It was also a promise of a change in their stature. No longer would they count among God’s “Chosen People.” No longer would they be known as “Sons of the Living God.” They were called to become “sons of God in Christ Jesus.”

When I was a child I was told that Baptism put an indelible mark on my soul. No matter that “indelible” was unintelligible at that age. No matter that it suggested that my nice, clean soul would now have the equivalent of a scratch. No matter that the truth was far more profound than my young mind could comprehend.

Robert Frost once wrote that “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” Why? Simply because, as a Son or Daughter, that is where you belong. You may return as the successful child of proud parents. You may return as the sinful, but sorrowful child of a faithfully loving Father.

As a “son of God in Christ Jesus” heaven is my home. So occasionally I have to ask: “what kind of son will I be when I return home. Will the Father see in me more than indelible mark? Will he see the face of one who has lived as his son?"