In the past few days in Mass we have been reading from Genesis 41-44 and Matthew 10… The similar messages from the experiences of Joseph and Jesus are: big mistreatment, but the message: Forgive the ignorant who hurt you and others. Let not your hurt be an obstacle to following God’s will. "But." we ask from our pain: "what is God’s will? Is it for me to be hurt?" We have been criticized. We have been working hard to do good against a tide of angry mobs who say it’s all a fraud. What we are doing is all a lie. Rejection hurts… But God says, "Pursue the Good, the True, and the Beautiful." God, in the form of the Holy Spirit, has given us intellect, will, memory, and imagination, sight, smell, and the other senses, all gifts to help us sense and see the Beauty God makes. Why do you think we love gardens so much? As children of God, our mission is "to take care of the garden"… So many images of farmers and wine makers in Scripture richly show us the efforts to plant seed, to grow grain, to make bread. To grow grapes to make wine. To make the staffs of life. "Go!" Jesus says. Tell the others." In my weakness, I ask, "what is my grain? What am I supposed to make? Where does God send me? What does God want me to say? How do I respond to God’s command to go out and teach? How do I respond to the Good News?" God’s commands are clear, "Take action boldly! Speak out, and if your word is thrown back at you with snears, shake the dust of that town from your sandles and move on…" I imagine that means we are not to take any of the snears on us as burdens. We are to shake the rejection off.
Over the past year, I have often been shocked and hurt by the accusations of fraud and lies by and in the institutions that I depend on. In Matthew 10, I am told that I am to shake that dust off while I am not to criticize or let the contrary thinking weigh me down. I am expected to pray a lot. I am expected to look for pure love and gravitate to that. I am to recognize my temptation to hang back yet to try to change people’s minds… I try to break the bonds to the past and move forward. There is something in me that tries to change things! Sometimes it seems that my efforts are useless, and I am small; my efforts are like grains of sand on a beach. The beach is the size of … infinity. But my grain is important to my God who made me to do that little bit. How kind he was to make me and give me my moment in His Sun! God bless us!