The apostles said to Jesus: “Increase our faith.” Jesus replied: “Were your faith the size of a mustard seed you could say to this mulberry tree: ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea’, and it would obey you…When you have done all you were commanded, say: ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do.’” Luke 17: 5-10
Chapter 17 of Luke’s Gospel opens with four separate and disconnected instructions that Jesus had given his disciples at different times regarding the challenges that are part of following in his footsteps. Today’s gospel-reading consists of the latter two of those instructions.
It’s important to note that Jesus did not tell his disciples that they were bereft of faith. He had just told them that there was no limit to the number of times they were expected to forgive anyone who had offended them. That led them to ask Jesus to increase their faith, so that they could meet that expectation.
We don’t exactly know why Luke bundled together these four instructions, other than to make the point that being a faithful follower was no easy task. The last of the four instructions which Luke put to his community is probably the most challenging for us in this day and age, in that it includes an illustration of what can be reasonably expected of a slave. While we might expect Jesus to have made a statement condemning slavery, we have to remember that he was a member of a society in which slavery was a reality. It was part of the practice of the culture and tradition in which he had grown up. Slaves were expected to carry a double load of work and service in the course of a single day and could not reasonably expect to be complimented for carrying out what they were engaged to do. Jesus was pointing out to would-be disciples that they would at times be expected to reach out to others in ways that went beyond what looked to be reasonable. Sometimes, we find ourselves being asked to go the extra mile or to give our precious time and attention to a needy or distressed person.
As for the disciples, Jesus was pointing out to them that living a life of faith would mean trusting and believing that God could work through everyone they encountered and be found in every imaginable event and situation. Living in faith means that none of us earns God’s approval or that keeping all of the commandments gives anyone a right to say to God: “You owe me, because I have been a good, faithful and observant Christian”
Any act of forgiveness, kindness and compassion we do is ultimately an expression of the gifts with which God has gratuitously blessed us and of our willingness to listen to the promptings of God’s Spirit alive and active in us and in our world. That’s the very essence of living in faith and trust in God.
It’s not unusual these days to hear people comment, when they look at the wars going on in our world and the people who have been elected or appointed as political leaders that the world has gone mad. Way back in 1910, the English journalist, poet and philosopher, G. K. Chesterton published a book entitled What’s Wrong with Our World. In answering the question he posed, he noted that a factor that had often been overlooked as one of the causes of a malfunctional world was a drift away from religious practice. He effectively asserted: “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.” Is that not saying that we who attest that we put our faith and trust in God have failed to persevere in doing so? The inscription on the US coinage states: “In God we trust.” Does the way we live and act testify to that? Elsewhere, Chesterton perceptively observed: “If there were no God, there would be no atheists.” Perhaps, we, too, would do well to pray with the apostles: “Lord, increase our faith.”
I conclude with a story borrowed from Jay Cormier, editor of Connections – a tool to help homilists to guide their worshipping communities to connect with the Sunday gospel-reading:
The admissions committee of a university college was reading through applications from high-school students applying for admission as first-year students the following year. Members of the committee were tired of applicants who imagined themselves with the potential to become astronauts, rocket-scientists, doctors, lawyers and politicians. However, one young man’s application caught their attention, simply because of its honesty. It read:
“I am neither a great student nor a leader. One could say that I am incredibly average. I work very hard for the grades I get…For the last three summers, I have been a volunteer at a camp for children with cancer. At first, I was terrified that I would say something stupid or do something that would add to their pain. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed working with these kids. I have been even more surprised at everything I have learned from them about life and death, about coping with illness and disappointment, about what is really important and good.
I would like to work with chronically ill and physically challenged children. I would like to pursue a degree in education and psychology so that I might try to give these girls and boys something of what they have given me.” (Jay Cormier, Table Talk: Beginning the Conversation on the Gospel of Luke, New City Press, NY 2009, p. 188) Needless to say, this application was placed in the Admit tray.
In today’s gospel-reading, Jesus concludes with a parable that highlights humility and perseverance as virtues disciples need to display. The application letter above displays both those virtues. The letter, the young man who wrote it, and the children from whom the letter-writer had learned so much are all revelations of the goodness and love of God present and working in our world. We can see those kinds of revelation through the eyes of faith. If only we had eyes of faith!