Our dependence on God

It is the 19th Sunday in Ordinary time and today’s gospel teaching comes about our dependence on God. As we learned from Proverbs 3:5-6 New International Version “5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; 6 in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.” This is the understanding of the “Anawim”, a Hebrew word from the Old Testament describing the “poor ones” who remained faithful to God in difficult times.

These humble people became known as the “Anawim” or the “faithful remnant.” The great Marian Canticle (Luke 1:46-50) “reveals in filigree,” as Pope Benedict XVI so beautifully teaches, “the spirituality of the biblical ‘Anawim,’ that is, of those faithful who not only recognize themselves as ‘poor’ in the detachment from all idolatry of riches and power, but also in the profound humility of a heart emptied of the temptation to pride and open to the bursting in of the divine saving grace.” Today’s gospel reading comes from Luke 12:32-48.

32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, your heart will be also.35 “Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning, 36 like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks they can immediately open the door for him. 37 It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes.

Truly I tell you, he will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at the table and will come and wait on them. 38 It will be good for those servants whose master finds them ready, even if he comes in the middle of the night or toward daybreak. 39 But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. 40 You also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”

41 Peter asked, “Lord, are you telling this parable to us, or to everyone?”

42 The Lord answered, “Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom the master puts in charge of his servants to give them their food allowance at the proper time? 43 It will be good for that servant whom the master finds doing so when he returns. 44 Truly I tell you, he will put him in charge of all his possessions.45 But suppose the servant says to himself, ‘My master is taking a long time in coming,’ and he then begins to beat the other servants, both men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk.

46 The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the unbelievers. 47 “The servant who knows the master’s will and does not get ready or does not do what the master wants will be beaten with many blows. 48 But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.”

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There is no question that no one knows when our Lord is going to have his second coming and our Lord himself told us that only God the Father knows when it will happen. In my view, when our Lord said that, which was written in the Bible, he was most probably saying it as Jesus who was also a man. But Jesus, the second person in the Blessed Trinity, most probably knows when he will come again. But clearly the message in today’s gospel is for us not to relay on our own thinking, but think always what God really wants us to do. For instance, we shouldn’t prepare our lives for the future of our families, but for the future of our souls!