Following hard on the Beatitudes, our gospel text for this Sunday has a challenging warning for all of Jesus’ disciples, right down to our own time and beyond. Jesus has just outlined a programme to transform our world by changing its values. That program is entrusted to his disciples, who are called to teach and exemplify those values in every age. It can only be accomplished through Jesus’ ongoing presence in our midst. However, because of the profoundly counter-cultural nature of his message, there will be a constant pressure on us to tone it down in order to fit in with our social context. The whole mission could just drift into a comfortable irrelevancy… unless it is constantly renewed by prophetic ministries calling us back onto our task.
Well that just about summarizes the texts for this week! You can listen to what I have to say here….
Howard Pilgrim