Jesus says in Sunday’s Gospel: “My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me.” Disciples hear Jesus calling us to follow him by creating communion among people torn apart by divisive identities, by witnessing love to those who promote anger as righteous or just, and by bringing healing to those who wound and kill. This is our vocation, our calling.
U.S. culture would have us believe we can follow Jesus and have a very different vocation. We can be heroes who save the world by taking up a weapon. We are influenced to believe we can fulfill our vocation when we catch and kill the bad guys who have also taken up a weapon. But Jesus never took up a weapon. He shows us another way of how to save the world. It is a very different kind of saving. It’s saving through healing – by being and acting as a healing SALVE for people. In Christ, salvation is salve-ation. We save the world when we heal the world. We heal the world in our ever so common yet passionate desire to for creating communion at the soup kitchen we go to every other Sunday. We heal the world in our ever so common yet passionate love for children who come into our hearts through foster care, adoption, or our neighborhood. We heal the world by our ever so common yet passionate healing presence we bring every Tuesday when our church group visits with people incarcerated at the jail. We heal the world by supporting our brother and sister Iranians targeted by this empire’s weapons bearers as enemies, by doing the same with our neighbors to the South who are targeted as illegal, as aliens, and as much worse. We can heal the the world by our ever so common yet passionate courage of standing up to pro-weapons personalities and groups. We are especially saving or healing the world when we courageously do so with people who call themselves Christian. We need courage with self-titled Christians and the groups they form that do not follow Jesus and instead follow the military. The military values killing human beings as their calling or vocation. Such military groups include Campus Crusade for Christ Military Ministry, Catholic Archdiocese for the Military, and armed police forces.
“Vocation is where our greatest passion meets the world’s greatest need.” (Frederick Buechner)
Prayer: Dear Jesus, my heart is open and listening to your calling me.
Question: What is my great passion and what is this world’s great need?
Vocation: April 21, 2013 Gospel John 10:27-30 Fourth Sunday of Easter