18th Sunday after Pentecost 26 September 2021 Authority
Where does the man get all this power? The Son of Man did many wonderful things, and He spoke and acted with authority (Lk 4,32) Authority comes from the same word as author and God has complete authority over His creation because he is author of the whole thing.
Imagine a play where the actors can change the script. In this case it is God's play and we are the actors. He lets us write our own script, but asks that we stay within the main idea of the play.
He gives us freedom which we then must learn to exercise in the right way.
If we put alien things in the story it has to be rearranged to end the right way.
How will the story finish? We know that Christ comes at the end, but many other details are not known yet.
There are millions of people involved and everyone has some say on what happens.
God also makes inputs to the play. He will not withdraw our freedom; but He will seek to repair any damage we have done.
If we use our freedom wisely good things will follow. We might be able to bring about a miracle by our intercession. We would undoubtedly, however, have a lot more miracles if we were closer to God, especially in humility and obedience.
God wants us to bring His authority to bear on the world around us, and generally bring healing and good fruits to people everywhere, as individuals and societies.
We can achieve this if we are at one with God. He desires our oneness, because then our prayer has more power. Where two or three agree…it shall be done for them (Mt 18,19).
Our Lord desires us to be one, also because perfect unity is itself part of the full salvation plan.
In Heaven we will have perfect unity with God and all others there. This should also be the case on earth, no matter how far we may be from it at present.
God can deal directly with individuals, but His main preference is to work through the Church, into which individuals have been incorporated.
Some think of God as remote, like someone who may have created us but takes little further interest.
He is in fact vitally concerned with us, only working through us, rather than just doing everything Himself. He wants us to grow into the part that we play.
We see the malice of the Pharisees, always trying to win arguments, even at the risk of their own salvation. We have to keep pulling off the tentacles of cynicism and despair.
Instead we maintain humility, trust, perseverance, and the like, taking our part in the ‘play’, coming in with the right script.
We compose our part of the script as we go, and we influence the final outcome. It will be our own work, but it will be guided by the Holy Spirit and will conform to what God would want from us. It is freedom but not license.
We learn not to despair just because there are difficulties, resolving to overcome those difficulties by grace.
Our Lord’s greatest miracle will be, perhaps, the convincing of His own disciples to believe in Him and place Him firmly at the centre of all our thoughts, words and actions.
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