{"id":1939,"date":"2016-10-30T14:44:20","date_gmt":"2016-10-30T18:44:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=1939"},"modified":"2016-10-30T14:44:20","modified_gmt":"2016-10-30T18:44:20","slug":"31st-sunday-in-ordinary-time-year-c-homily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/31st-sunday-in-ordinary-time-year-c-homily\/","title":{"rendered":"31st Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C – Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

31st<\/sup> Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C<\/a>
\nWisdom 11:22-12:2
\nPsalm 145:1-2, 8-9, 10-11, 13, 14
\n2 Thessalonians 1:11-2:2
\nLuke 19:1-10
\nOctober 30, 2016<\/p>\n

Zacchaeus is described as being \u201cshort in stature<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 He was short enough that he couldn\u2019t see Jesus through the crowd.\u00a0 Being small, he probably won\u2019t have been able to fight his way through the crowd.\u00a0 It was important enough for him to see Jesus that he ran ahead of the group enough to find a tree to climb so he could see Jesus.<\/p>\n

This might not seem like a big deal.\u00a0 Kids climb trees but in the culture of the time no self-respecting wealthy man would do such a thing.\u00a0 It would have been embarrassing but Zacchaeus didn\u2019t care about that.\u00a0 He wanted to see Jesus.\u00a0 It sounds like he was getting his priorities in order with Jesus at the top.<\/p>\n

When Jesus comes to the tree, he took the initiative to look up and tell Zacchaeus he will stay at his house.\u00a0 Zacchaeus is thrilled.<\/p>\n

Physically we all start out small.\u00a0 I remember as a little child and going to parades always wanting to be up front when we went to parades.\u00a0 Otherwise, I couldn\u2019t see anything.\u00a0 But here in church, being \u201cshort in stature\u201d can talk on a whole other status.<\/p>\n

Our God is an infinite God.\u00a0 God is all-knowing and all-powerful.\u00a0 God is everywhere.\u00a0 So what are we compared to God?\u00a0 Are we even a grain or a drop of morning dew?\u00a0 How can we ever make ourselves worthy of his calling?<\/p>\n

Does God even notice us?<\/p>\n

Of course, God notices us.\u00a0 We are not too small for God to see us.\u00a0 God is everywhere and aware of everything.\u00a0 Even when we try to hide behind something, God sees us.<\/p>\n

We might think we don\u2019t matter much to God.\u00a0 What have we done to make ourselves worthy of God\u2019s love?\u00a0 We might feel like we are nobody special.\u00a0 We might think we aren\u2019t worth noticing but we would be wrong.<\/p>\n

We are worthy of being noticed by God not because of what we do.\u00a0 We are worthy because God makes us worthy.\u00a0 We are all created in God\u2019s image to be loved by God.\u00a0 We are made great when we accept what God has given us and use it for the building up on God\u2019s kingdom.\u00a0 We pray thy kingdom come<\/em>.\u00a0 We need to make this our goal in the here and now.<\/p>\n

I spoke before about \u201chiding from God.\u201d\u00a0 It might seem odd to think about hiding from God as we gather here in church.\u00a0 Church probably isn\u2019t the place to go to hide from God but just as \u201cshort in stature\u201d can take on a deeper meaning in feeling insignificant, \u201chiding from God\u201d can\u00a0taken on a deeper meaning.<\/p>\n

We are not going to hide from God in Church but we might want to hide aspects of our lives from God.\u00a0 Most specifically we might want to hide our sins.\u00a0 We know they aren\u2019t good and we hope God doesn\u2019t notice them.\u00a0 The thing is, since God is everywhere, of course He notices our sins.\u00a0 God is present with us even when we commit the sin.<\/p>\n

Yet God loves us.<\/p>\n

One might suppose that because God is so great and needs nothing from us that if we sin, then God won\u2019t love us anymore.\u00a0 Fortunately, God doesn\u2019t think that way.<\/p>\n

God doesn\u2019t have to love us.\u00a0 God chooses to love us.<\/p>\n

For those of you who are parents, think of a time when your child did something really bad.\u00a0 You might have gotten very upset, very mad with them but did you stop loving them?\u00a0 God doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

For those of you who are children, have you done something that really mad your parents upset?\u00a0 Did they stay upset?\u00a0 God doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, as parents or children we are not perfect so forgiveness is not easy but God always offers it.\u00a0 When you doubt God\u2019s mercy, look at Jesus hanging on a Crucifix.\u00a0 If God doesn\u2019t want to forgive you, then why did Jesus die on the Cross?<\/p>\n

God wants us to know his love.\u00a0 God wants us to know that we are not too \u201cshort in stature\u201d for him to notice us.\u00a0 God wants us to know that He is aware of our sins and will forgive us.<\/p>\n

We might think that if God is aware of our sins, then we don\u2019t need to confess them.\u00a0 But we need to realize that in going to confession and admitting our sins, then we open ourselves to feeling God\u2019s love.\u00a0 If we keep our sins hiding inside us, then we are blocking out God.\u00a0 When we confess them, God wipes our sins away and makes us great by bestowing his grace upon us.<\/p>\n

On our own, we might be \u201cshort in stature\u201d but God raises us up.\u00a0 We open ourselves to Christ and work together so God\u2019s kingdom can come.\u00a0 Then we are all \u201cRaised in Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

31st Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C Wisdom 11:22-12:2 Psalm 145:1-2, 8-9, 10-11, 13, 14 2 Thessalonians 1:11-2:2 Luke 19:1-10 October 30, 2016 Zacchaeus is described as being \u201cshort in stature.\u201d\u00a0 He was short enough that he couldn\u2019t see Jesus through the crowd.\u00a0 Being small, he probably won\u2019t have been able to fight his way …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘31st Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C – Homily’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[82],"tags":[203,202,201],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-vh","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1939"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1939"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1939\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1942,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1939\/revisions\/1942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}