Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go

Gn 18,16-33; Ps 102; Mt 8,18-22
1 JULY

Where does Jesus go? Where his Father sends him moment by moment, through motion and inspiration of his Holy Spirit. We find this truth revealed by Jesus himself in his discourse to the disciples at Jacob’s well. Invited to take food, Jesus told them that his food is to do the will of the Father and to carry out his work. He has no other food to take. In some ways it is also the first answer given to the devil in the desert: “Man does not live only on bread, but on every Word that comes out of the mouth of the Lord”. Jesus came not to do his will, but the will of the one who sent him. The Father speaks and commands. He listens and obeys.

Meanwhile, the disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat.” But he said to them, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.” So the disciples said to one another, “Could someone have brought him something to eat?” Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of the one who sent me and to finish his work. Do you not say, ‘In four months the harvest will be here’? I tell you, look up and see the fields ripe for the harvest. The reaper is already receiving his payment and gathering crops for eternal life, so that the sower and reaper can rejoice together. For here the saying is verified that ‘One sows and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap what you have not worked for; others have done the work, and you are sharing the fruits of their work” (Jn 4,31-38).

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst. But I told you that although you have seen (me), you do not believe. Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and I will not reject anyone who comes to me, because I came down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of the one who sent me. And this is the will of the one who sent me, that I should not lose anything of what he gave me, but that I should raise it (on) the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I shall raise him (on) the last day” (Jn 6,35-40).

Remember how for forty years now the Lord, your God, has directed all your journeying in the desert, so as to test you by affliction and find out whether or not it was your intention to keep his commandments. He therefore let you be afflicted with hunger, and then fed you with manna, a food unknown to you and your fathers, in order to show you that not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of the Lord. The clothing did not fall from you in tatters, nor did your feet swell these forty years. So you must realize that the Lord, your God, disciplines you even as a man disciplines his son (Dt 8,2-5).

It is urgent to distinguish between missionary and missionary. There is the mandate in the world to proclaim the Gospel, to make baptized disciples, to teach how the Gospel is to be lived in every word and there is the missionary who lives his life in the place where he is called to carry out his daily activity. While the former goes from place to place, city to city and village to village always sent and moved by the Holy Spirit, the latter goes in the same place from person to person, always under motion and inspiration of the Spirit of the Lord. For one and the other, everything must always be obedience to the Spirit of God. If one places himself outside the Spirit, he is no longer his missionaries, whom he has sent. In the mission there can be neither autonomy nor separation from the Spirit.

When Jesus saw a crowd around him, he gave orders to cross to the other side. A scribe approached and said to him, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus answered him, “Foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head.” Another of (his) disciples said to him, “Lord, let me go first and bury my father.” But Jesus answered him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their dead.”

Jesus is an honest person because he is true and he is true because he is honest. He has never deceived or deluded anyone. Do you want to follow the Master? Know that the Master is always in obedience to his Father. You want to follow him, but first you have to bury your father? Not even for you there might be sequel. From the moment of decision, the past no longer exists. There is only one present of obedience to every command of God.

Mother of God, Angels and Saints ensure that Christians become true missionaries of Christ Jesus.