Three years ago, to this very day, I got a call from the bishop’s office. He called and said,
“Would you mind going to Saint Matthias in Parma? I said, “Yes, I would love to!” He replied,
“Ok, you start next weekend.”
Now the reason I remember this is because a couple of days after they called, it was my last
weekend at Holy Family Parish and these were the readings. This is why it was so profound for
me. The reading, as we heard in the second reading, is about Abraham who God calls to go on a
sojourn. As I was praying with that reading, I didn’t know what sojourn meant. Any of you
know? It’s a journey. A sojourn is like a temporary journey. It’s like you are on your way to
somewhere; you are taking a little vacation and you go and stay, you sojourn, you go away
somewhere for a little bit and then you go somewhere else.
So, I was telling the people at Holy family how I was sojourning there; I was assigned for four
years, but after two years, I got called here and that turned out to be a temporary stay until I
got here.
What I love about this reading are a couple of things; some of it is kind of funny. Saint Paul is
describing Abraham here and his wife Sarah. He is telling us they are beyond their years of
having a child. But God promised them that through their son, they would have descendants as
numerous as the stars in the sky and as numerous as the grains of sand on the beach. Then he
said, “From this man himself as good as dead.” So, Abraham is so old he’s as good as dead but
God still wants to work through him.
And so, this unbelievable miracle happens where they conceive and they have Isaac. After they
have Isaac and he starts to grow up, Abraham and Sarah must be excited about this boy,
bringing the generations forth, God says to Abraham again, ‘I want you to take your son, your
only son, and sacrifice him to me.’ Can you imagine what Abraham and Sarah must have been
going through at that moment, that God has given them this gift of their son and now they’re
called to sacrifice him?
This is what I love, the way Saint Paul describes this at the end. He said, “Abraham who was put
to the test offered up Isaac. And he who had received the promise was ready to offer his only
son of whom it was said, ‘through Isaac descendants shall bear your name.’”
Now I love this because he says, “He reasoned that God was able to raise even from the dead
and he received Isaac back as a symbol.” He was given this calling, this command from God and
the only reason he was following through with it is he thought, ‘Well, God’s going to figure this
out. If I have to give up my son and sacrifice him, God must have to raise him back from the
dead because he’s made this promise to me.’
I have a couple of thoughts for all of us is: you probably won’t get a call from the bishop’s office
asking you to do something. But you might get a call from the Pastor. My hope is, as being your
pastor, that each and every one of you may want to offer yourselves for this parish. That in
some way, you want to give of yourself here. This church is made up of living stones and each
and every one of you is called for some mission and for some purpose and for some service to
the parish.
It’s been pretty neat over the past three years because there’s been a lot of times I’ve had to
call on people as being pastor. It’s wonderful to see the people who have responded, “Yes,”
either to helping or to volunteering or to coming to something, the way that their lives have
been transformed all because they said, “Yes.”
I want you just to think about that. Is there any way that God might be calling you to be
involved in this parish? I also want you to be open. There may be times where I ask something
of you. Be open to that call. Some of you might say, ‘Well. Father, I’m getting old. I’ve
volunteered enough. I’ve done this before.’ I have heard that a lot.
Well, Abraham was considered dead(laughter). And God still worked through him. God still
wants to work through you. No matter where you are in your life, God has a purpose for you;
God has a plan for you.
As we come here together, we come every Sunday gathered as a parish. We come here
gathered as the body of Christ. He is calling you; be open to him. Open your heart to say yes. If
you haven’t heard his voice, or haven’t heard his call or don’t know what you want to get
involved in, just ask me, because he wants you to be alive; he wants this church to be alive, he
wants this parish to be alive.
Just as Abraham and Sarah said yes to God, their descendants were more numerous than the
stars in the sky and the sands of the beach. And this is true here of our place in Parma. Through
you, he wants you to go out and evangelize and to bring as many people back as you can. If we
truly open ourselves up to Him, our reach will be far more sweeping than we ever could
imagine.
Abraham was still useful to God, even though he was almost dead. You’re still useful to him too.
As a parish, let us open our hearts, open our minds, open our ears to what God may be calling
us to. Your sacrifice, like Abraham and Sarah’s, might be difficult. At some point in our lives,
we’re called to trust God. Some point in our lives that trust is going to come when our lives
seem completely a mess, when we are overwhelmed, that’s when trust happens.
Maybe you are experiencing that right now in your life. That craziness that might be going on in
your life, that grieving that might be going on in your life, that change that might be going on in
your life, it’s but a sojourn. It’s only for a time. And if that hasn’t happened to you yet, I promise
you that it will. And when that does happen, can you just take a step forward and trust? It is
through trust and openness that we follow our God. It is through trust and through openness.
