The Chosen https://thechosen.link/1Y1R7 – highly recommended (Episode 7 Wed night) 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time As We Forgive Those Who Trespass Against Us 7:10-7:25 Apostles attracting big crowds/Sheep without a Shepherd (Mark 6:30-34) 7:25-7:40 Genesis 5-7 7:40-8:00 Intentions Opening Prayer 7:05-7:10 Lord, you promised that when two or three of us are gathered in your name, you are there, Well, we are here – multiples of 2 or 3, asking your blessings to be poured out upon those whom have asked for your healing tonight. We would also like to ask for your blessings on each and every of us here tonight: Please Lord, bless our lives, bless our families, bless our friends, bless our health, bless our work, And, most of all, bless our relationship with you. Finally, Lord, we are meeting tonight over You! Please help us discern the meaning you intend for us, how they should intersect our lives, and how we can be transformed by your wisdom bit by bit to become more like You. We ask these things through your Son, Jesus Christ. Our Father who art in heaven Hallowed be thy name Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. Lead us through all our trials and temptations
And deliver us from evil. Amen
WHAT IS PRIDE?
1. Good pride: a person can be justified in being proud of his/her family, school, community, or country provided it is measured against an objectively good standard. That’s what being “justified” means: conformed to good. For example, it is normal to be proud of your son or daughter for getting straight As or being the best on a team, but not if he/she didn’t play by the rules, or put themselves ahead of the team. To be proud of your country if, say, you were in Germany as it invaded Poland to start WWII, would be unjustified pride. 2. Pride for oneself: it is fine to be proud of your own accomplishments if a) you also recognized your flaws and b) you don’t boast about them. The reason for being cognizant of one’s shortcomings is as a kind of “check” against runaway superiority, or arrogance. Think of it: if you are not cognizant of your shortcomings, then that would mean you are only cognizant of your perfections. Scary, right? As for not boasting, have you ever heard someone boast? It’s kind of nauseous to everyone except the person doing it (and sometimes that person’s parents). It is also worth noting that a person who is full of excessive pride or arrogance is often the last one to realize it. The irony is that the one who thinks they have no flaws is the one who has the greatest of the deadly sins. That person’s friends or family need to do a kind of intervention and save him! 3. The deadly sin of pride is the excessive love of one’s own excellence. That kind of pride doesn’t want to answer to anyone. This led to Fall of Man because it desires complete autonomy – to not have to answer to anyone. In the case of the Fall, it was wanting to escape from God. It is a form of insanity in the sense that the created (humans) cannot get rid of the Creator (God) any more than a character in a novel can get rid of the author. 4. The greatest safeguard against excessive pride is to remember to give thanks to God for all good things. If you receive a compliment for something you did really well, just mentally treat it as though they are giving credit to God through you; then a simple “thank you” is easy. The Twelve Return, Attracting Big Crowds… “Sheep without a Shepherd” (Mark 6:30-34) 7:25-7:40 Context: Last week (Mark 6:7-13) left off with Jesus sending his Apostles out for the first time to the surrounding villages of Galilee to practice what he had been teaching them: casting out demons, healing the sick, and preaching the Gospel: “Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand!” Mark 6:30-34 The apostles gathered together with Jesus and reported all they had done and taught. People were coming and going in great numbers, and they had no opportunity even to eat. He said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.” So they went off in the boat by themselves to a deserted place. People saw them leaving and many came to know about it. They hastened there on foot from all the towns and arrived at the place before them. When Jesus disembarked and saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd. And he began to teach them many things. Q: How do we know that the first mission of the Apostles was successful? People were following them, coming and going in great numbers such that they had no time to eat or rest. Q: Why did Jesus take them away after their return from preaching besides physical rest? God is the source of their success, so Jesus was teaching them replenish and recharge or they wouldn’t be able to sustain their equanimity while interacting with throngs of people day in and day out. Jesus did this constantly, and he is quick to make them do it.
Q: The people anticipate where Jesus and the Apostles are going and decide to intercept them by heading there on foot. How big is the Sea of Galilee and how long would it take people to walk to the other side? It is a fresh water lake 13 miles across in the widest part. It is about 35 miles around it (circumference). If they were to walk from just south of Tiberias to Capernaum, that would be about 15 miles which would take them approximately 4 hours to walk.
Q: If the Apostles took their time in the boat and rested en route to Capernaum, maybe some of them got a few hours rest. When they reached Capernaum, the crowds are already waiting for them. As tired as they were, why did Jesus start teaching them again?
a) He was moved with pity for them because they were like sheep without a shepherd. These throngs of people wanted help, not only physically but they were drawn spiritually. The people of this region had been waiting for the Messiah since the fall to Assyria 700 years earlier.
b) This might reminds you of another time Jesus said to his Apostles, “The harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few.” (Mt 9:37)
c) Jesus was fulfilling messianic expectations, such as we find in Jeremiah and Psalms:
“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the flock of my pasture—oracle of the LORD. Therefore, thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, against the shepherds who shepherd my people: You have scattered my sheep and driven them away. You have not cared for them, but I … myself will gather the remnant of my flock… from all the lands and bring them back to their folds...” - Jeremiah 23:1-6
Psalm 23: 1-6
The LORD is my shepherd; there is nothing I lack. (Jesus tells the Apostles to take nothing with them – God is all they need. Faith.)
In green pastures he makes me lie down; to still waters he leads me; he restores my soul. (Jesus takes the Apostles to rest. Equanimity.)
He guides me along right paths for the sake of his name. (Truth and goodness for the sake of truth and goodness, not personal gain.)
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff comfort me. (Literally, a rod was for protection, and the staff was for guidance and nourishment (shepherds used to knock olives off olive trees for the shepherds to eat.). Spiritually – ‘to fear nothing’ speaks for itself.)
You set a table before me in front of my enemies; (The Last Supper – the banquet of the kingdom, as the guards were coming for him.)
You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. (Anointing was for healing and death/Passover; my cup overflows- the new Covenant.)
Indeed, goodness and mercy will pursue me all the days of my life. (The promise of the covenant – to be part of God’s kingdom)
Speaking of Psalm 23, the Church has always seen this famous psalm as the “Prophecy of the Sacraments of Christ.”
Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, 314 AD
St. Ambrose, 380 AD
What’s also interesting about the Gospel story this week is the part that the Church skipped over in selecting the reading. It’s not the fact that they skipped a section that’s interesting because the story gets read at another time; what’s interesting is that Mark has inserted another story in the middle of the Apostles’ mission story.
You may remember that Mark did this a couple of weeks ago. Remember with the Temple official (Jairus) whose daughter had died? And Jesus says ‘okay lead the way,’ and in the end he brings the girl back, BUT, right in the middle of the story comes a woman from the crowd who had been hemorrhaging for 12 years, and she touches Jesus’ tunic and gets healed. Recall that we compared and contrasted the two interwoven stories to look for clues as to why Mark did that. Well, he’s doing it again.
Last week: Mark 6:7-13 – Jesus sends out the Twelve on their first Mission
Skipped: Mark 6:14-29 – The Death of John the Baptist (dinner party with officials and adulteress wife, Herodias…)
This week: Mark: 6:30-34 – The Apostles Return from their first Mission
As you might be figuring out, Mark is known for doing this “sandwich technique” in the hopes of drawing the reader to look for some other, deeper meaning. In this case, Mark inserts the corrupt King Herod – with his risqué dinner party resulting in the beheading of the Baptist – in the middle of the story of the Apostles going out to proclaim the Kingdom of God.
Q: Why would Mark insert King Herod and death of John the Baptist into the middle of the story about the Apostles’ first preaching experience?
It appears that Mark intends to contrast the injustice of the false kingdoms of corrupt earthly rulers with the divine justice that is being delivered by Jesus and preached by the Apostles, which is the Kingdom of God.
Q: Some non-Catholics have questioned whether Jesus wanted to start a Church, as opposed to just letting people do their own thing. Do you think these last couple of readings might help answer this question?
Jesus didn’t just have “disciples” (students) who decided to follow him. Jesus went out and chose them from the very beginning of his ministry, and he chose TWELVE of them (to represent the 12 tribes of Israel in the New Covenant), and he named them Apostles, not disciples, which means to “to be sent out,” and then he trained them to “go out” and do what he did so that when he was gone they could continue what he started; and he said to Peter, “You are Peter, and upon this rock (Cephas) I will build my Church”; and Jesus spent his entire three years, night and day, up to the Last Supper with these Apostles, and then again for his entire 40 days after the Resurrection teaching and preparing them; and then he sent the Holy Spirit to them on Pentecost to guide them thereafter. These actions of Jesus with his Apostles were inseparable from his life and mission on earth. There is no indication of a “one and done” by him alone, anywhere or at any time, nor would that have made sense.
The Apostles – if they didn’t believe in their mission, I doubt they would have been willing to suffer so much and even go to their deaths for something that was made up or faked; especially since the message was the opposite of self-promotion and self-gain! The message was about loving and forgiving your fellow man. If I was going to have to suffer ridicule, lashings, stonings, beatings, decapitations, and crucifixions for something I made up, I would hope to have a good, selfish reason for it – but even there would be no point because I’d be dead.
Bible Study Genesis 5 – 7 7:40-8:00
From Cain/Abel/Seth to Noah
A couple of points from Chapter 4 to connect us to Chapter 5:
1) Remember, Cain was a farmer and Abel was a shepherd. After Cain murdered Abel, he is punished and nothing will ever grow for him again. He then leaves for the land of Nod. Cain and his family became the first city dwellers. Sorry, just reading this made me look up the earliest cities humans know about.
Q: Historically, what are the oldest cities in each continent?
Middle East (Jericho)- 9,000 BC Europe (Argos-Greece)- 5000 BC Asia (Taxila-Indus Valley)- 3360 BC Africa (Luxor)- 3200BC Americas (Mayas-Guatemala)- 900 BC
Here is a map of the ancient Middle East. You can see the “fertile crescent,” where Israel would be (Canaan), and where Eden is speculated to have been (we don’t really know). Since Cain went to the east to Nod, I noted where that could have been.
2. Note Gen 4:25: “Adam knew his wife and she gave birth to a son whom she named Seth, because God has granted me another offspring in place of Abel, since Cain has killed him.” Notice Eve acknowledges God’s graciousness in granting her another son – not in place of Cain who left for Nod, but in place of the righteous Abel.
3. The literal translation is actually not so much “offspring”, as “seed.” What would be the significance of ‘seed’?
The seed represents God’s promise that the seed of the woman will eventually crush the head of the serpent (Gen 3:15).
Genesis Chapter 5 – the genealogies from Adam to Noah. We are not going to read this chapter although I want you to see a methodology in how the author lists the years. In each case, the author states the age when the person has a son, the years he lived after that son was born, and then his total years. That repeats itself in every case except for Enoch and Noah. Noah’s death is mentioned in Ch 9. But read Enoch below – he doesn’t die – he is taken up bodily by God. The only other ones who are taken up bodily are Elisha in the fiery chariot and Mary. (Discussion)
This is the record of the descendants of Adam. When God created human beings, he made them in the likeness of God; he created them male and female. When they were created, he blessed them and named them humankind.
Adam was one hundred and thirty years old when he begot a son in his likeness, after his image; and he named him Seth. Adam lived eight hundred years after he begot Seth, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Adam was nine hundred and thirty years; then he died.
Note that humans are now made in Adam’s likeness (not God’s), after his image (which is the image of God). No longer are we in the likeness of God, only his image. We have the image of God in us – which is why all humans strive for God’s characteristics, such as perfect love, perfect justice, perfect knowledge, and perfect happiness. But we lost sanctifying grace, which was a strong natural inclination to execute those desires – to truly be “like” God. This is our fallen nature, which the Church also calls Original Sin.
When Seth was one hundred and five years old, he begot Enosh. Seth lived eight hundred and seven years after he begot Enosh, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Seth was nine hundred and twelve years; then he died.
Seth is the new seed of Eve that will eventually lead to Noah, Abraham, David, and then finally Jesus, the seed who will crush the head of the serpent. Mary is called the new Eve as it is her “Yes” (vs Eve’s no) and her “seed” that becomes Jesus.
When Enosh was ninety years old, he begot Kenan. Enosh lived eight hundred and fifteen years after he begot Kenan, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Enosh was nine hundred and five years; then he died.
When Kenan was seventy years old, he begot Mahalalel. Kenan lived eight hundred and forty years after he begot Mahalalel, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Kenan was nine hundred and ten years; then he died.
When Mahalalel was sixty-five years old, he begot Jared. Mahalalel lived eight hundred and thirty years after he begot Jared, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Mahalalel was eight hundred and ninety-five years; then he died.
When Jared was one hundred and sixty-two years old, he begot Enoch. Jared lived eight hundred years after he begot Enoch, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Jared was nine hundred and sixty-two years; then he died.
When Enoch was sixty-five years old, he begot Methuselah. Enoch walked with God after he begot Methuselah for three hundred years, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Enoch was three hundred and sixty-five years. Enoch walked with God, and he was no longer here, for God took him.
Enoch – the first to “walk with God” since Adam, and the first to be taken up from here bodily.
When Methuselah was one hundred and eighty-seven years old, he begot Lamech. Methuselah lived seven hundred and eighty-two years after he begot Lamech, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Methuselah was nine hundred and sixty-nine years; then he died.
When Lamech was one hundred and eighty-two years old, he begot a son and named him Noah, saying, “This one shall bring us relief from our work and the toil of our hands, out of the very ground that the LORD has put under a curse.” Lamech lived five hundred and ninety-five years after he begot Noah, and he had other sons and daughters. The whole lifetime of Lamech was seven hundred and seventy-seven years; then he died. When Noah was five hundred years old, he begot Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
Long Ages of in Genesis (primarily in Gen 5 and 11).
I am often asked how to understand the long life spans attributed to the patriarchs in Genesis.
There is no direct connection between these and the scientific theory of evolution, but I some people think there is a problem for us since the ages given in the genealogies (primarily in chapters 5 and 11) have been used to date the origin of humanity to the relatively recent past (six to ten thousand years ago).
It would also seem that it is charged, people living for more than 900 years is in conflict our acceptance of contemporary science. On this point, I would note that our acceptance of science does not at all imply that we think God never performs miracles. If God wanted to make Methuselah live to be 969 years old, we certainly believe that God could intervene in the natural order of things and make that happen.
A better question —which is true for all biblical interpretation—is whether that (miraculous ages) is really the message of the text.
The chapter we just reviewed gives very specific numbers for the genealogy from Adam to Noah. If these mean what 21st century English speakers naturally take them to mean, then we would believe either that some people lived very long lives in the distant past or that the Bible was reporting incorrect information.
But Genesis was not written in 21st century English, so our concern is not with what these words would mean if they were written by us today. Instead, we should ask, “What do the words mean in the language and culture in which they were written?”
In answering this, the first thing to note is that we have records from ancient Mesopotamian culture – sometimes numbers were used like we use them today – the way we count and measure, such as like in a receipt we have for sale of a slave and a building from about 2500 BC. But at other times, numbers are used numerologically; that is to say, a number’s symbolic value could be used to convey mystical or sacred meanings rather than just its numerical value (think of astrology vs astronomy). An example: in one version of the “Sumerian King List” we have are outlandishly figures for when some kings supposedly reigned in Mesopotamia (i.e., in the city-state of Eridug, King Alulim ruled for 28,800 years!). No one thinks they are simply historical reports of true numerical values so when we see some numbers in literature from the ancient Near East (like in Genesis), we must consider in which way they were being used.
For example, there are about 30 ages provided and they all end in 0, 2, 5, 7, 9. That’s a lot of numbers but then the chances that all 30 do not end in 1, 3, 6, 8 is about 1 in 100 million. So that would make us suspicious, so we look further. One theory developed from this is that they used the sexagesimal system, which thinks of numbers in terms of 60 (believe it or not, we still have remnants of this in how we measure time – 60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour). Anyway, applying this gives us one option that explains the ages.
However, we will probably never know for sure if we correctly understand the significance being used by the ancient Hebrews who wrote the text. The question is if this is a better explanation for interpreting whether the numbers have symbolic or rhetorical significance to the author’s original audience (if we even know what that was). However we choose to interpret these ages, it does not affect the our story of faith or the truth of the message. In this case, it at least gives us the sense that there are somewhat long periods of time between Adam and man falling into sin again leading God to start over with Noah, and then the same thing after Noah – man falling again culminating in the Tower of Babel which leads God to start over again, this time with Abraham.
Closing Prayer
Father, thank you for loving us into existence
and for coming back for us every time humans turn their backs on you.
Lord Jesus, thank you for coming here to walk in our shoes
To feel what we feel, to see what we see, and to show us the way;
Thank you for paying for our forgiveness
for leaving yourself behind
and for sending your Holy Spirit to help us the rest of the way home.
Holy Spirit, fill every space inside of us. Leave no room for Satan or our selfishness to act.
In all our encounters, help us to see you with your eyes, hear with your ears, and speak with your words.
Hail Mary…
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