HOMILY FOR SATURDAY: 1ST WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME [YEAR B]

HOMILY FOR SATURDAY: 1ST WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME [YEAR B]

THEME : Your light must shine in the sight of men

BY: Fr Deotacious Chikontwe SMA

READINGS OF THE DAY
1 Samuel 9:1-4,17-19,10:1
Psalm 20:2-7
Mark 2:13-17

LITURGICAL COLOUR
GREEN

INTRODUCTION
Good morning my dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate Saturday of the First Week in Ordinary Time of Year B.

FROM OUR FIRST READING
In our first reading, we heard how the Lord gave His people, the Israelites, their first king called Saul. Saul was chosen from the smallest tribe among the Israelites, and from among the smallest clan in the tribe of Benjamin. He was just an ordinary man whom God called to be the leader over His people, fulfilling what the people requested of Him. But God did not choose by worldly standards, prestige or power, and instead, called those whom He deemed to be worthy, and helped and guided them to be truly worthy and capable in doing what they had all been entrusted to do. God empowered and guided Saul to be the worthy leader over all of his beloved people. Saul was called to follow the Lord and to put himself in the service of God, in doing whatever was necessary to lead and guide God’s people to their one true Lord and King. This was what God had entrusted to Saul to do, by making him as the king over all of His people.

FROM OUR GOSPEL READING
In our Gospel passage today, we heard of the moment when the Lord Jesus came by the place of Levi, the tax collector and called him to follow Him. Levi listened to the Lord’s call, left everything he had behind, his job and works, his office and all, and followed the Lord. Not only that but he also brought the Lord to his fellow tax collectors, and the Lord had dinner with all of them, as many among them wanted to listen to Him, His teachings and follow Him as well. This earned the Lord the derision, disapproval and criticism from the Pharisees who thought that the Lord should not have spent time to mingle and even have dinner with those tax collectors, who were widely despised and hated, treated as sinners and people who were unworthy of God and His grace.

CONCLUSION
The gospel reading shows us that the Lord does not wait for us to reach a certain moral standard before he reaches out towards us. He enters into communion with us as we are, in all our frailty and brokenness, with all our faults and failings. Indeed, he is at home with us in our weakness and imperfections, as a doctor is at home with the sick. It is easier for him to enter the lives of those who know they need his help. If we are open to his desire to be in communion with us, we will be empowered by his presence to move beyond where we are. We will be inspired by his Spirit to keep turning from our more self-centred ways towards his way of serving God and each other.

FOR SIMILAR HOMILY, CLICK HERE >>>>