The Gospel for Tuesday of the eighth week in Ordinary Time is taken from Mark 10th, chapter 28, 31st verse. Peter began to say to Jesus, we have given up everything and followed you. Jesus said, amen. I say to you, there is no one who has given up house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and for the sake of the Gospel who will not receive a hundred times more. Now in this present age, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands with persecutions and eternal life in the age to come. But many that are first will be last, and the last will be first.

It’s clear that Jesus had a message that people could not fathom at the beginning because they didn’t have the wisdom of the Holy Spirit to help them. So when he talks about the first being last, the last being first, he’s saying, I’m going to be giving you a whole new vision of who you are and what this world is about and why you’re here. And when he’s saying to his disciples, be patient. It’s difficult to rethink everything, but simply know that it leads to a fullness. It’s not a loss, but a gain. Please pause and reflect upon these images.

And then I will close with a prayer. Foreign closing prayer. Father, we always want things to be more simple. We want to say, if I do this, I get this reward. Bless us with a freedom from that kind of thinking. Open us up to a new mystery, a mystical life where God is continually reforming who we are and opening our mind to why we are here.

And we ask this in Jesus name, Amen.