Welcome to Finding God in Our Hearts. The following production, Pastoral Reflections with Monsignor Don Fisher, is a weekly program of deep spiritual insight on Scripture, revealing the indwelling presence of God. We appreciate your listenership and if you find this program valuable, please subscribe and share with your friends. Share this program is funded with kind donations by listeners just like you make your donation@pastoralreflectionsinstitute.com Today we celebrate the 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time. The opening Prayer Grant us we pray, O Lord our God, the constant gladness of being devoted to you, for it is full and lasting happiness to serve with constancy the author of all that is good, through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
A Reading from the Old Testament from the book of Proverbs, 31st, chapter 10, 13th verse 19th and 20th verse in the 30 and 31st verse when one finds a worthy wife, her value is far beyond pearls. Her husband, entrusting his heart to her, has an unfailing prize. She brings him good and not evil all the days of her life. She obtains wool and flax, and works with loving hands. She puts her hands to the distaff, and her fingers ply the spindle. She reaches out her hand to the poor and extends her arm to the needy.
Charm is deceptive, beauty fleeting. The woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Give her a reward for her labors, and let her works praise her at the holy gates. The Word of the Lord Responsorial Psalm Blessed are those who fear the Lord A Reading from the New Testament from St. Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, fifth chapter, first through the sixth verse concerning times and seasons. Brothers and sisters, you have no need for anything to be written to you, for you yourselves know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief at night.
And when people are saying peace and security, then suddenly disaster comes upon them like labor pains upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness for that day to overtake you like a thief. For all of you are children of the light, children of the day. We are not of the night and or of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep as the rest do, but let us stay alert and sober. The Word of the Lord Now Louis verse Remain in me, as I remain in you, says the Lord.
Whoever remains in me bears much fruit. The gospel for this 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time is taken from St. Matthew 25th, chapter 14 30th verse. Jesus told his disciples this parable. A man was going on a journey, called in his servants, and entrusted his possessions to them. To when he gave five talents to another two to a third one each according to his ability, then he went away immediately.
The one who received the five talents went and traded with them and made another five. Likewise, the one who received two made another two. But the man who received one went off and dug a hole in the ground and buried his master’s money. After a long time, the master of those servants came back and settled accounts with them. The one who received five talents came forward bringing the additional five. He said, master, you have given me five talents.
See, I have made five more. His master said to him, well done, my good and faithful servant. Since you were faithful in small matters, I will give you great responsibilities. Come, share your master’s joy. Then the one who had received two talents also came forward and said, master, you gave me two talents. See, I have made two more.
His master said to him, well done, my good and faithful servant. Since you were faithful in small matters, I will give you great responsibilities. Come, share your master’s joy. Then the one who had received the one talent came forward and said, master, I knew you were a demanding person, harvesting where you do not plant, gathering where you did not scatter. So out of fear I went and buried your talent in the ground. Here it is back.
His master said to him in reply, you wicked, lazy servant. You knew that I harvest where I do not plant, I gather where I did not scatter. Should you not have put my money in the bank so that I could get it back with interest on my return? Now then, take the talent from him and give it to the one who has 10 for everyone who has more will be given, and he will grow rich. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away and throw this useless servant into the darkness outside where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth. The Gospel of the Lord Ram.
Sam, as I’ve mentioned often to you, we’re at the very end of a church year. In other words, we’re finishing up a whole reflection on this beautiful Gospel of Matthew. And as we get closer to the end, we are focusing on what should be the impact of this work, what should be happening within us. If we paid attention, if we’ve opened our hearts to the mystery of what this man Matthew was trying to share with us, we’ll come to understanding something. And the understanding we’re looking for it seems to me clearly from this set of readings is we’re looking carefully at who are we? Who are we as a people?
Who are you, who am I? What’s our essence? And if I look at this set of readings, it’s interesting. You’ll see that the first one gives us an image, first of all, that there is this way that God speaks about who we are. When he says, I want to marry you. I want to be with you.
I want you to have a relationship with me, of intimacy. So what we know is that somehow that we are children of our Father. And that Father wants a union with us that he compares to marriage. Which means it goes well beyond parent to child, but more person to person, God to us as an adult. So we are a people who are connected to God, married to Him. You listen to the images that are in that first reading.
We see a man who is married. And the man is married to a woman. And she is a great joy to him. She is the image of who we are to become. And so what does she do? She has two things that she does for her husband.
She makes material. She creates warmth, comfort for him. And then also she reaches out to the poor and the needy. And so her praises are sung. It’s not that it’s not her body, her beauty, but it’s her actions, her motives, her intentions. She gives warmth.
And she gives some kind of wonderful care, nurturing, beautiful image of who God marries. When God marries us, what he’s expecting to see happen to us because of our union with him. As we become more like Him. We are children of our Father. We are made to be like Him. And marriage is a beautiful image of the way in which he’d like us to imagine we have a relationship with him.
One of intimacy. And out of that instantly comes a quality of warmth and service. And then in the next reading, we see Paul talking about who we are also. And he’s talking about we’re not people of darkness. We’re not people of depression and darkness and sin. That’s not our nature.
No, what we’re made for is light. We are made to be enlightened. So we have an image of. We are basically children of our Father. But we’re called to be like Christ. Christ is the anointed One.
What was he anointed with? A human being, in one sense. Filled so much with this anointing enlightenment. That he saw so much and understood so much as a human being. Because he had within himself this incredible talent. It’s an incredible gift that was that he could see his relationship with God, understand it, and know that God was living inside of him.
And everything that Jesus was able to do, he made clear was not he alone who did it. It was his Father within him, enabling him to do it. And so we see the other image is that we are children of the Father, but we’re also called to be like the Son. And the Son is this amazing figure that is filled with this capacity to heal and to bring life to people. And what is it based in? It’s based in the fact that God has promised to live within this figure, Jesus, to such an extent that Jesus is God for us.
It is like that, but not the same. We don’t become God, but we become like Jesus, anointed with what? This mysterious talent of bringing life to another person. Then we go to the Gospel. Such a fascinating parable. One of the things I love about parables is how they are so filled with multiple layers of meaning.
I can go back to a parable year after year after year and still come out with something I never saw before. But there’s something really beautiful in this particular parable about this relationship that we have with God that empowers us to be a source of life for the people around us. And that gift of indwelling presence is given to people in different levels in different ways. So let’s just imagine that there are three groups. Some groups of people are given all kinds of amazing gifts, and they realize it, and they have a lot of talent. And what do you think of talent in this image?
Is money. It’s a form of money. So what that might mean is that if I think about what is money? What does money give you? What does it do? Prestige, importance, somewhat.
But the real thing that money is is energy. If you have unlimited funds and you want to do something, you know, having that kind of energy is a resource that will, you know, achieve all kinds of things. So let’s just say talents in the form of money is energy. So this parable is about God sharing His presence, his energy in another human being. And to some, he gives them amazing talent. But the clear image is that this God figure in this parable is the owner who leaves his servants in charge of something.
And the thing that he gives them is the energy to fulfill the obligation. And their obligation is to make it work for others. So the one who receives a great deal of talent goes off and makes a great deal more. So let’s just say that he took the gifts that he had. He shares them with People. And as he shares them, they became even more.
He became more gifted, more enlightened. And then the next one was similar. He has, let’s say, an average amount of talent. He has two talents. He does the same thing. You know, he takes those two talents.
He believes he has them. He knows he has them. They give him confidence, and he goes out and makes two more. Living the life that God has called him to be, he becomes more what that is, that very thing that he’s intended to be. The more you have, the more is given to you. But then we get to the real issue of this parable.
The real focus is this last person who isn’t that talented, who didn’t get that much. I think it’s just fascinating. I never thought of it before, but, you know, it would be probably harder for this last person to believe that the talent was enough to be really successful. So he was really worried about whether or not he would be able to do whatever he was called to do to make this grow and become. Which would be living it out, doing the things that God called him to do, saying the things that he was given as an insight to share. He didn’t believe in it.
He didn’t believe they were that good, perhaps, but. And he worried about something else. He worried about the way in which it might work, the way it might go, and what if he fails? So he was a fearful person. He thought, well, what if I get in trouble? You know?
I mean, all of us that have gifts from God often worry about, you know, if we have an insight that seems new and different. We’re afraid to speak it because we’re allowed to be looked at as some kind of crazy person or something. And we don’t have confidence in what’s just been given. So we sort of bury it. We don’t open our mouth when we are invited to by God with an insight that he’s given to us to give to others. And so he buries it.
That is just. That’s the point. What happens when you believe that God dwells in you, that you are his child, that you have been given this gift. And this gift is given to you to be given to other people. And when it comes to you to be given, you doubt it because you’re afraid you’ll be ridiculed or maybe you’ll be looked at as stupid or whatever. I know that feeling.
I think most of us know that feeling. A lack of confidence in the reality of who we are, who God has made us to be, who He’s Intended us to be who he’s empowered us to be. We doubt it. We don’t believe in it enough. And if you don’t believe in the gifts that you’ve been given, you lose them. That’s what the whole parable is really trying to say.
Those who have been given something and they believe that they’ve been given it and they share it, they are the ones that are fulfilling the role that they’ve been given in this kingdom. But those who don’t, who doubt it, who afraid, they bury it. They don’t say anything. They keep all their insights, all their sense of things to themselves. So what are we learning? Well, one thing is clear, that this image of this man who is a man, you would first say, well, he’s afraid.
He’s a fearful guy. But then at the same time, when God talks, or, well, in the story, when the master talks to him, he doesn’t call him fearful or he calls him lazy. Lazy, you lazy, worthless, wicked servant. Lazy means you didn’t do your work. So what didn’t he do? Well, you say he didn’t share what he received, but the real work would have been receiving it.
The work would have been, how do I believe in the things that God has given me? How do I trust in those things? What, where do I get my confidence? And it’s in this deep, demanding question that we all have. Who am I and what am I here for? That’s the big issue of this parable.
Do you really believe in what God has revealed in Scripture? That we are these incredibly gifted people filled with God’s grace and power to be instruments of his healing and his enlightenment that he gives to other people? Do you really believe that? Because I don’t know what you think about when you think about who am I? But some of us think about, well, it’s our feelings. That’s what makes us who we are, or our thoughts.
That’s what makes us who we are, or our possessions or our bodies or our gender, or the color of our skin or our possessions, all those things. Is that who I am? No, not really. No. The work is asking the hardest, most profound question. And it goes back to something more than just, who am I?
But when you look at the world, you have to say, what am I living in a temporary place of examination and testing and finding out whether I’m worthy to be rewarded with the next place? Or is it something much more subtle and much more exciting? Is it about being a part of the evolution, the enlightenment of my self, my circle of Friends, the whole world, that’s what I’m engaged in. And God has given everybody depending on their destiny a whole lot of power. A little bit of power, a little bit of insight, doesn’t matter. But the point is, unless you believe that you’ve been given this gift, it evaporates.
So the image at first doesn’t sound fair. You know, if you’ve been given a lot, you’ll get more. If you weren’t given much, you won’t have anything. Well, it’s not the giving, it’s the receiving end of that that’s so important. If you don’t believe that you’re a gifted life giving figure in your circle of friends, you’re going to not be able to be in the moment confident enough to express things or just feel things for them. And you know, we think we communicate primarily by words, but it’s so much more complicated.
Our intention when we’re with friends, our intention for whether we’re competing with them or whether we’re wanting to empower them, those are things that are powerful communicators. And all God is saying is you’ve got that in you, but that’s not really you. Who you really are is who I created. And what you’re here for is what I gave you a destiny for. And believe in that and trust that when you do, then you’re filled. Whether you were the most insightful person and wrote 50 books, or whether you said something in a moment that changed someone’s life, it doesn’t matter.
What matters is you understand it, you believe in it, and you’re living it. It’s a challenge that is probably at the heart of why we’re here. And it takes work, real homework, to examine almost everything, especially your foreign closing prayer. Father, your gifts are so abundant and we often feel that we are in a relationship with you where you are judging us and wanting us to be more and more. And your desire is that we just be who we are to be. And it’s a natural state and we have to learn, we have to learn to be familiar with that incredibly wonderful experience of being a source of life for others.
So bless us with this gift. It’s hard for us to grasp, we are fearful and we are afraid of making mistakes. And if we just trust more, we’d be fine. So give us that great gift of trust. And we ask this in Jesus name, Amen. The music in our program was composed and produced by Ryan Harner for this show.
Pastoral Reflections with Monsignor Don Fisher is funded with kind donations by listeners just like you. You can make a one time or recurring tax deductible donation on our website, pastoralreflectionsinstitute.com we thank you for your listenership and your continued support. Without it, this program would not be possible. Pastoral Reflections with Monsignor Don Fisher is a production of the Pastoral Reflections Institute, a nonprofit in Dallas, Texas, dedicated to enriching your spiritual journey. Executive Producer Monsignor Don Fisher produced by Kyle Cross and recorded in Pastoral Reflections Institute Studios. Copyright 2020.