It is the Master who sends...

WORD 2day: Saturday, 14th week in Ordinary time

July 11, 2020: Isaiah 6: 1-8; Matthew 10: 24-33

It is the Lord who sends; it is the Master who calls; it is the Teacher who commissions! It is not because I am worthy to be sent, or qualified to be called or skilled to be commissioned... but it is because it is the Lord who calls! As St. Paul says it in such simple terms: "those whom he called, he justified" (cf. Rom 8:29). However unworthy I am, when the Lord has appointed me for a mission, he makes sure that mission goes on through me. 

As soon as we speak of being called and being commissioned, let us not think of those in the ministry - the priests or the religious or the lay ministers or those who have some special responsibility in the faith community! The 'called', the 'sent', the 'commissioned' referred to here, are not those but every Christian who is called, commissioned and sent by the very fact of one's baptism in the Lord! 

Yes, we are called, commissioned and sent, each of us! And it is the Master who sends, the King who clothes us with his majesty and glory, adorns us with his identity and entrusts with his power. It is in the name of the Lord, that we go - not because we can go or we are competent to go - but because, the Lord, the King, the Master, wants us to!

On my part, the challenge is to be mindful of the fact that it is the Lord who has sent me and commissioned me and to be convinced that the Lord takes care of everything around me, provided I live my life faithful to the call. A thousand may fall at my side and ten thousand at my right hand, but nothing will come near me, for I have made God my refuge, prays the Psalmist (in Ps 91:7).

It is the Lord who has called me and it is Lord who has commissioned me, I am accountable to the Lord and only to the Lord. In this world and to those around me, I have nothing to prove! All that I need to do, is stand in awe at the majesty of the Lord, believe in the Lord's sovereignty and submit myself in total faith into the hands of God, saying "Here am I Lord, send me!" When the Lord does, we will see the glory of God revealed in marvelous ways!