Proclaim the gospel to every creature

At 4,13-21; Ps 117; Mk 16,9-15
27 APRILE

The command of Jesus to his Apostles does not allow any interpretation. As it sounds or recites, so it must be lived. “Go into the whole world and proclaim the Gospel to every creature”. One does not become God’s kingdom by birth, but by call. What must the Apostle call to? To obedience to faith. Where does faith in a heart start from? From the Word of the Gospel proclaimed with all the power of the Holy Spirit by a disciple of Jesus who every day grows in conformation and configuration to Christ the Lord. We clothe ourselves with Christ, we are filled with the Holy Spirit, the Word is proclaimed, the Holy Spirit draws to Christ announced in the Word, becoming the voice of conversion. This is what St. Paul says of his vocation to be an Apostle of Christ Jesus.

Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised previously through his prophets in the holy scriptures, the gospel about his Son, descended from David according to the flesh, but established as Son of God in power according to the spirit of holiness through resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord. Through him we have received the grace of apostleship, to bring about the obedience of faith, for the sake of his name, among all the Gentiles, among whom are you also, who are called to belong to Jesus Christ; to all the beloved of God in Rome, called to be holy. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  For I am not ashamed of the gospel. It is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: for Jew first, and then Greek. For in it is revealed the righteousness of God from faith to faith; as it is written, “The one who is righteous by faith will live” (Cf. Rm 1,1-17). But I have written to you rather boldly in some respects to remind you, because of the grace given me by God to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles in performing the priestly service of the gospel of God, so that the offering up of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the holy Spirit. In Christ Jesus, then, I have reason to boast in what pertains to God. For I will not dare to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to lead the Gentiles to obedience by word and deed, by the power of signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit (of God), so that from Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum I have finished preaching the gospel of Christ (Rm 15,15-19).

If the Apostle of the Lord proclaims the Gospel according to the rules of the Gospel, it will always produce a fruit of eternal life. What is the first rule of the Gospel that the disciple will have to live? That of being with the Word one thing. He is the Gospel. The Gospel is he. He is the life of the Word in history, the truth of the Gospel in the midst of men. This is the first great sign of the presence of Christ and of the Holy Spirit in the life of the Apostle. The lived Word makes the Apostle not only credible, it also constitutes him a tree with many fruits of salvation and redemption. Instead, if the Apostle is distracted, separates from the Word, lives it and does not live it, he will never produce fruits of salvation and conversion of hearts. Out of the Word we are out of the Holy Spirit.

When he had risen, early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons. She went and told his companions who were mourning and weeping. When they heard that he was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe. After this he appeared in another form to two of them walking along on their way to the country. They returned and told the others; but they did not believe them either. (But) later, as the eleven were at table, he appeared to them and rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart because they had not believed those who saw him after he had been raised. He said to them, “Go into the whole world and proclaim the gospel to every creature.

We go all over the world, not just one part of it. The Gospel is announced to every man. If the Apostle brings with him the Holy Spirit because he lives of the Word, in the Word, as the true body of Christ, it is always the Spirit the one that gives the understanding of the announced Gospel. Theological understanding, the systems of reading the Gospel, can help, but never must they replace the Word, the Gospel, the gift of the Word and of the Gospel as it sounds. One does not convert himself to theology, but to the Gospel. Theologies can be many. The Gospel is only one. The understandings of the Word can be infinite. The Word is only one. Jesus commands to proclaim the Gospel.

Mother of God, Angels and Saints ensure that every disciple of Jesus proclaims the Gospel.