Ascension - Homily 2

Homily 2 - 2008

Teach them to observe all the commandments I gave you… How on earth do you do that?  It might help to reflect on how Jesus himself went about it?  How did Jesus teach (people) to observe his commandments?  I think, for a start, he caught their interest; and I think that he managed to do that by showing them that he cared about them, saw them as important, that he believed the best about them, or, simply, in a word, by loving them.

I think that the next thing that he did was to get them interested in wanting to be like him.  They needed to see that he had something about him that they didn’t have, but would like to have: a certain freedom and wisdom and inner peace and a readiness to reach out to others.  Once they wanted to be like he was, they were ready to listen and to find out the answer to what made him tick. Then, he was able to tell them … to tell them about his sense of God, his sense of the dignity of every person, his dream of how the world could become a wonderful world to live in.  (That’s what his commandments are about, after all – how to live so that the world can become a wonderful place to live in.)

Was that enough?  I don’t think so.  I think they needed encouragement.  They needed to see it was possible, i.e. they needed hope.  They needed help to put up with the natural resistance in themselves, i.e., they needed freedom to not quite always measure up, and yet to know that they were forgiven – wholeheartedly forgiven.  And we could go on…

Did Jesus succeed in teaching people to observe all he had commanded them?  No way!  He didn’t succeed with many at all, really… not with Judas, not with most Pharisees, not with most of the people, even those he healed and fed.

How are we going?  How are we managing to get others in our time and in our world to join with us in making the world a wonderful place to live in?  It might be because we haven’t managed to attract their interest.  Perhaps they are perfectly satisfied with how they’re going.  They mightn’t listen to us because they don’t sense that we really care about them or are genuinely interested in them.  Or because they don’t see us as any different from them, and with nothing to give them – no obvious wisdom or inner peace or special warmth.  It might be our fault.  It might be their fault.  It might be everyone’s fault.  It might be no one’s fault.

Jesus didn’t succeed with everyone… but he tried – to the point of laying down his life.  We mightn’t have a terrific track record, but we can keep on trying.  But we shall help others to change only to the extent that we are prepared to keep on loving, forgiving, being at peace, etc..