Where two or three are gathered together in my name
Dt 34,1-1 2; Ps 65; Mt 18,15-20
14 AUGUST
Jesus says: “Where there are two or three gathered in my name, there am I in their midst”. It is a promise that Christ the Lord will always keep. But what does it mean to be gathered, or do something, or talk, or act, or move, or reunite in the name of Jesus? Let’s take an example from the Old Testament and certainly we will be helped in understanding.
With his shield-bearer marching before him, the Philistine also advanced closer and closer to David. When he had sized David up, and seen that he was youthful, and ruddy, and handsome in appearance, he held him in contempt. The Philistine said to David, “Am I a dog that you come against me with a staff?” Then the Philistine cursed David by his gods and said to him, “Come here to me, and I will leave your flesh for the birds of the air and the beasts of the field.” David answered him: “You come against me with sword and spear and scimitar, but I come against you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel that you have insulted. Today the Lord shall deliver you into my hand; I will strike you down and cut off your head. This very day I will leave your corpse and the corpses of the Philistine army for the birds of the air and the beasts of the field; thus the whole land shall learn that Israel has a God. All this multitude, too, shall learn that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves. For the battle is the Lord’s, and he shall deliver you into our hands.” The Philistine then moved to meet David at close quarters, while David ran quickly toward the battle line in the direction of the Philistine. David put his hand into the bag and took out a stone, hurled it with the sling, and struck the Philistine on the forehead. The stone embedded itself in his brow, and he fell prostrate on the ground. (Thus David overcame the Philistine with sling and stone; he struck the Philistine mortally, and did it without a sword.) Then David ran and stood over him; with the Philistine’s own sword (which he drew from its sheath) he dispatched him and cut off his head. When they saw that their hero was dead, the Philistines took to flight (1Sam 17,41-51).
David goes against the Philistine with a slingshot and five stones. But he does not go in the name of his slingshot, but of his God. Who is the God of David? He is the Creator of heaven and earth, the Lord, the Omnipotent, the God of heavenly hosts. When you go in his name you do not even need a slingshot. The Lord can also knock him down by himself. But since David must show every man that his God is superior to all others, that is why he goes to fight the Philistine. The whole earth will know his Lord. Do we gather in the name of Christ so that the whole universe, for us, knows who Jesus is? Do we meet together with his faith, charity, hope, prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance, humility, patience, mercy, love and forgiveness? If we do not show the divine and human beauty of the name of Jesus to the world we are not united in his name. David shows the power of the name of his God. What do we show about Christ Jesus? What do we show others? If the other does not see the name of Christ acting in us, how will he manage to believe in him? If we do not reveal Him, we are not in the name of the Lord.
“If your brother sins (against you), go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that ‘every fact may be established on the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If he refuses to listen to them, tell the church. If he refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector. Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again, (amen,) I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything for which they are to pray, it shall be granted to them by my heavenly Father. For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”
In the name of his truth, of his grace, of his Word, of his light, of his Cross and Resurrection. In the name of Jesus it means essentially going clothed with Christ to manifest the beauty of our Christ to each of our brothers. If every disciple showed the other the goodness, the holiness and the purity of his Christ and let himself be overcome by the goodness and beauty of the Christ of the brothers, the world would come and be converted. It would see and change his opinion on Jesus, on the Church, on the Christian, on the Gospel, on the Word and on morality. It would see unimaginable, unthinkable, divine things, not earthly and not of this world. In the centre of the world it would see the true face of God be born and bloom again on the face of every disciple of Jesus.
Mother of God, Angels and Saints ensure that the disciples always manifest the beauty of Jesus.