The Time is Now

A reflection for the 3^rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B. The readings are Jonah 3:1-5, 10; Psalm 25; 1 Corinthians 7:29-31 and Mark 1:14-20.

Last Saturday I went to visit my friend Lara. She has ALS – Lou Gehrig’s  disease, which is a degenerative disease that affects the nervous system and nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. ALS affects muscle control and the symptoms get worse over time. ALS begins by causing muscle twitches or spasms, or maybe slurred speech. Eventually the patients have difficulty walking and then cannot walk, they cannot speak, have difficulty swallowing. Most ALS patients die when they simply cannot breathe. Lara was diagnosed 9 months ago – most people live with ALS about 5 years, but some can live 10 years.

We had a very nice visit. She told me about what she wanted for her funeral. I told her she didn’t have to make some of those decisions yet; she still has time. She can still walk, she can still talk and eat. I gave her Communion. We prayed. I asked her if she wanted to receive the Sacrament of the Sick and she said she would think about it. I told her to let me know if she needed help with that. On Monday, her husband called me to say they had left messages with the priest so Lara could receive the Sacrament of the Sick but had not heard back, so I called the priest and helped arrange it. On Tuesday morning Lara received the Anointing of the Sick.

On Wednesday evening I received a call to let me know that Lara had died that afternoon.

All I can think of is “a life cut short”. She was my age. She had two daughters, the same ages as my kids, 28 and 25. Her youngest daughter just got married last Summer.

And when I listen to today’s readings, especially the second one, from St. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians telling us that “time is running out” and “the world is passing away”, I can’t help but think of Lara: A life cut short.

Although Lara was ready. But I am not. I don’t get the urgency of today’s message. I think I still have 40 years left!

Maybe you are like me and also don’t sense the urgency of God’s call.

Maybe you are like Jonah in the first reading. He really didn’t sense the urgency in God’s call. God asked him to go this way and Jonah went as far away the other way. Only after he was swallowed and regurgitated by a giant fish did he, reluctantly, do what God asked him to do – go to Nineveh and tell the people: repent; time is running out; this world is passing away.

And the people of Nineveh, who were not Jews, they did sense the urgency of the message and they immediately repented; they turned their lives around.

Jesus begins his public ministry with the same urgent words: “Repent. Believe in the Good News. The Kingdom of God is at hand. Time is running out.  This world is passing away.”

If you’re at all like me, you don’t like the word “repent”.  Repent makes me think that I have done something wrong and I need to be remorseful and apologize. That may be the case – but then I am reminded that repent means conversion; it means change. It literally means to turn; turn away from something and turn towards something else. We turn away from the things that distract us from God and turn towards God. The Hebrew word for repent, means “to return”. Repent means to turn towards, to return to, God.

The disciples, Simon, Andrew, James and John sense the urgency and immediately they leave their nets. They turn away from their nets, from those things that tie them down, that hold them back, that entangle them and turn towards Christ and follow Him.

Today Jesus calls you too to follow Him.  The time is now. And it’s an urgent message, but not because we should be scared that time is running out, but because He loves us. His urgency is the urgency of a lover who has been away from his beloved for 18 months and is urgently driving home for Christmas: Time is running out. The world is passing away. And it’s urgent because Jesus wants to be with us – now. Not tomorrow. Not next month. Now. Today. Jesus wants you to be with Him now because He wants you with Him in Heaven. That’s what we are created for. That’s all that matters. God is creating you for Heaven. That’s what the Church teaches. The Church teaches the beautiful “Universal Call to Holiness”. That means that all of us are called to be holy; to be saints; to be in Heaven. Do you want to go to Heaven? That’s the only choice.

Today Jesus is calling you to follow Him to be with Him. At every Mass, Jesus calls you to follow Him. Don’t wait. Now is the time. Turn away from what holds you back and turn towards Him, here present to you in the Eucharist.

Turn away from your nets, from your fears, your doubts. Leave behind your regrets and follow Him and He will bring you home, to Heaven. And He will make you fishers of people – so that when you get to Heaven, you won’t be alone.

Follow Him.

The time is now.