Other Sunday and Holy Day Readings
15th SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (Cycle B)
Readings:
Amos 7:12-15
Psalm 85:9-14
Ephesians 1:3-14
Mark 6:7-13
Abbreviations: NAB (New American Bible), NJB (New Jerusalem Bible), RSVCE (Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition), IBHE (Interlinear Bible Hebrew-English), IBGE (Interlinear Bible Greek-English), or LXX (Greek Septuagint Old Testament translation). CCC designates a citation from the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The words LORD or GOD rendered in all capital letters is, in the Hebrew text, God's Divine Name YHWH (Yahweh).
God reveals His divine plan for humanity in the two Testaments, and that is why we read and relive the events of salvation history contained in the Old and New Testaments in the Church's Liturgy. The Catechism teaches that our Liturgy reveals the unfolding mystery of God's plan as we read the Old Testament in light of the New and the New Testament in light of the Old (CCC 1094-1095).
The Theme of this Sunday's Readings: Accepting or Rejecting
Union With Christ
Men and women in every generation since Jesus's earthly mission
have the choice of accepting or rejecting His Gospel message of salvation and the
gift of His New Covenant Kingdom of the Church. The Church is the vehicle Jesus
established to lead humanity on the pathway to eternal salvation. To accept
that path is a decision based on the exercise of free will that did not begin
with the Incarnation and mission of God the Son. It is a choice that men and
women have had to make throughout salvation history: to embrace and accept a
way of life in obedience to the commands and prohibitions for those in covenant
with the Lord God, or to determine for oneself what is right or wrong and
rejecting the God's path to salvation (Mk 16:15-16). The Catechism instructs
us: "It is in the Church that Christ fulfills and reveals his own mystery as
the purpose of God's plan: 'to unite all things in him.' St. Paul calls the
nuptial union of Christ and the Church 'a great mystery.' Because she is united
to Christ as to her bridegroom, she becomes a mystery in her turn.
Contemplating this mystery in her, Paul exclaims: 'Christ in you, the hope of
glory'" (CCC 772, quoting
Eph 1:10; 5:32; 3:9-11; 5:25-27;
Col 1:27)
In the First Reading, God sends the shepherd-prophet Amos to call the people of the apostate Northern Kingdom of Israel to repentance and to condemn their illicit altar at Bethel. The Israelites of the Northern Kingdom and their king violated obedience to Mosaic Law and rejected the rituals of worship God established in the Sinai Covenant. Their king rejected God's legitimately ordained priesthood and the liturgical assembly at the Jerusalem Temple. Under the guise of a nationalistic reformation, they drove out the priesthood of Aaron to form a counterfeit priesthood, and built a separate temple where they established illicit rituals of worship (1 Kng 12:26-33; 2 Chr 11:13-17).
In the Responsorial Psalm, the psalmist declares God has been good to His people in the past, and He has good plans for His people in the future. His blessings include peace, prosperity, and salvation for those who "hear what God proclaims," have a reverent fear of offending the Lord, and humbly present themselves to Him in the Liturgy of Christian Worship.
In the Second Reading, St. Paul wrote to the Christians at Ephesus concerning the blessings of their divine election. They are God's adopted children, sealed by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit through their baptism in Christ. Paul's message reminds us that all Christians should be grateful for their divine election through Christ Jesus as sons and daughters in the family of God. We show our gratitude by striving to accept and be obedient to the Gospel message and related teachings of Jesus and God's holy words governing our conduct in Sacred Scripture. Those teachings must not be altered or watered down to suit the agenda of those who support illicit worship as counterfeit preachers accepting the changing views of secular culture.
In the Gospel Reading, Jesus sends out the Apostles on their first mission to heal the sick, drive out demons, and call the people to mend their relationship with God through the repentance of their sins. It is a holy mission that their successors continue to share with the world, guided by Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. We should remember that in the first mission, as today, some people will hear and accept Jesus's message of salvation, and others will reject or pollute the message by their false understanding. Our prayer for ourselves and the world is what we ask in the Responsorial Psalm, "Lord, let us see your kindness, and grant us your salvation."
The First Reading Amos 7:12-15 ~ The Priest of the
Northern Kingdom Rejects Amos's Message
12 Amaziah, priest
of Bethel, said to Amos, "Off with you, visionary, flee to the land of Judah! 13 There earn your bread by prophesying, but
never again prophesy in Bethel; for it is the king's sanctuary and a royal
temple." 14 Amos answered Amaziah,
"I was no prophet, nor have I belonged to a company of prophets; I was a shepherd
and a dresser of sycamores. 15 The
LORD took me from following the flock and said to me, Go, prophesy to my people
Israel."
After the death of King Solomon, the ten northern Israelite tribes deserted his son, King Rehoboam, and formed a separate kingdom, electing a king who was not a Davidic heir. Their king, Jeroboam I, immediately broke away from the covenant God established with the children of Israel at Mt. Sinai. He dismissed the ordained priests who were the descendants of Aaron and established a separate priesthood from among men who were loyal to him. He didn't want his people continuing to worship at the Temple in Jerusalem, so he built sanctuaries at Bethel and Dan and installed his version of liturgical worship that included the worship of pagan gods (1 Kng 12:20-33; 2 Chr 11:14-16). Each of his successors continued to promote illicit worship in the Northern Kingdom despite God's warnings through His prophets that their abandonment of God's covenant was going to bring down God's wrath upon an apostate people and their king (1 Kng 14:15-16). In another attempt to call the people of the Northern Kingdom of Israel to repentance, God sent Amos to the Northern Kingdom's sanctuary at Bethel.
In our passage, we read about two opposing views concerning the exercise of religion. Amaziah, the priest of the illicit sanctuary at Bethel, was loyal to the king's idea of what was acceptable worship for the people of the Northern Kingdom, including idol worship (1 Kng 12:28-30). Yahweh's prophet Amos was an outsider from the Southern Kingdom of Judah. He was loyal to the exercise of worship as defined by Yahweh in the Sinai Covenant. In the Liturgy of right worship offered through the priestly descendants of Aaron (the first high priest) through sacrifices and worship at the Jerusalem Temple that Yahweh communed with His people.
Amaziah rejected Amos as Yahweh's representative and his call for repentance and conversion, and he challenged Amos's right to prophesy in God's name. He told Amos he had no authority as a prophet in the Northern Kingdom at "the king's sanctuary" (notice he did not say Bethel is Yahweh's Sanctuary). He told Amos to return to earn his living as a prophet in the Southern Kingdom of Judah (verses 12-13). Amos responded that he did not make his living as a prophet. He said that he was not a member of a prophetic brotherhood, nor was he a prophet attached to the court of the king of Judah, but a shepherd and tender of sycamore trees. However, Amos declared that he did have authority to prophesy at Bethel because God called him to that mission and gave him divine authority to preach repentance and condemn the people of the Northern Kingdom of Israel (verses 14-15).
To whom do you listen concerning the exercise of "right worship"? Do you follow those who have redefined the interpretation of Scripture to suit their agendas or the trends and morals of secular society and political leaders, like the apostate people of the Northern Kingdom? Or do you remain faithful to the teachings of Jesus Christ and the deposit of faith He entrusted to Peter and the Apostles who founded His Kingdom of the Church? The Church's teaching has remained unchanged and faithfully passed down from Jesus to the Apostles, to the Bishops and priests of His Church, and to the faithful of every generation who call themselves true believers and defenders of the Word.
Responsorial Psalm 85:9-14 ~ Hearing the Lord and
Welcoming the His Salvation
Response: "Lord, let us see your kindness and grant us your
salvation."
9 I will hear what
God proclaims; the LORD, for he proclaims peace. 10 Near indeed is his salvation to those who
fear him, glory dwelling in our land.
Response:
11 Kindness [hesed =
covenant love] and truth shall meet, justice and peace shall kiss. 12 Truth shall spring out of the earth, and
justice shall look down from Heaven.
Response:
13 The LORD himself
will give his benefits; our land shall yield its increase. 14 Justice shall walk before him and prepare the
way of his steps.
Response:
The psalmist declares that God has been good to His people in the past, and He has good plans for them in the future. His blessings include peace, prosperity, and salvation for those who "hear what God proclaims" (verse 9), have a reverent fear of offending the Lord (verse 10), and who offer worship at His Temple where He dwells in the land of His covenant people.
Verse 11 expresses a turning point in a reunion of covenant love and truth with justice and peace, using the Hebrew word hesed. The Old Testament expresses God's love for His people in terms of the word hesed [checed], which our English translations usually render as "love," "faithful love," or "loving-kindness." However, hesed has a much narrower definition than the English word "love" conveys. In the Hebrew Scriptures, hesed refers to the kind of love promised and owed in an exchange of affection and loyalty based on the mutual obligations of love formed in the bonds of a covenant relationship. When hesed refers to human relationships, it means union and commitment in the context of the marriage covenant that creates a family. However, used between men or nations, it expresses the covenant bond of a treaty obligation (Gen 21:27; 1 Sam 11:1). When hesed describes God's interaction with human beings, it represents Yahweh's faithfulness to His covenant and the blessings and mercy He shows His obedient covenant people (Ex 34:6-7). See the document "Is Hesed the Same as Agape."
In verse 12, the psalmist proclaims that at the time of the reunion between God's covenant love, truth, and justice, salvation will come from Heaven ("justice shall look down from heaven"). Several Fathers of the Church saw the poetic imagery in verses 11-13 as the Incarnation of the divine Word in the union of the Godhead with human nature in Jesus of Nazareth. After Jesus announced the New Covenant in His blood (Lk 20:22) in His Last Supper Discourse, He also declared that He was the revelation of Divine Truth, saying, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (Jn 14:6). Concerning this verse, St. Athanasius wrote, "Truth and mercy embrace in the truth which came into the world through the ever-virgin Mother of God" (Expositions in Psalmos, 84).
The Second Reading Ephesians 1:3-14 ~ Accepting our
Divine Election
3 Blessed be the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every
spiritual blessing in the Heavens, 4 as he chose us in him, before the foundation of
the world, to be holy and without blemish before him. In love, 5 he
destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ, in accord with the
favor of his will, 6 for the praise
of the glory of his grace that he granted us in the beloved. 7 In him we have redemption by his blood, the
forgiveness of transgressions, in accord with the riches of his grace 7 that
he lavished upon us. In all wisdom and insight, 9 he has made known
to us the mystery of his will in accord with his favor that he set forth in him
10 as a plan for the fullness of times, to sum up all things in
Christ, in Heaven and on earth. 11 In
him we were also chosen, destined in accord with the purpose of the One who
accomplished all things according to the intention of his will, 12 so that we might exist for the praise of his
glory, we who first hoped in Christ. 13 In
him you also, who have heard the word of truth, the Gospel [good news] of your
salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,
14 which is the first installment
of our inheritance toward redemption as God's possession, to the praise of his
glory.
St. Paul gave his affectionate greeting to the Christian community at Ephesus in Asia Minor (verses 1-2). He then continued with a hymn of praise to God for the many blessings Christians have received in their divine election as adopted children in the family of God. Paul's hymn of praise is full of images that may have come from early Christian hymns in the Liturgy of Christian worship.
A Trinitarian structure is evident in Paul's declaration of praise, beginning with God the Father (verses 3-6, 8, 11), then Christ (verses 3, 5, 7-10, 12), and finally the Holy Spirit (verses 13-14). Paul lists the spiritual blessings Christians have received through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ:
Paul testifies that God's divine plan to bring all creation under the rule of God the Son was predetermined before "the foundation of the world" (verses 3-5; also see 1 Pt 1:20). He writes that it has come upon this generation of Ephesian Christians for the mystery/secret of God's divine plan to be revealed/made known to those who accept Christ as Savior and fulfill all things in Christ (verses 6, 9, 12, 14). Verse 10 uses the merism "Heaven and earth" to express the concept of the universe. Hebrew had no word for the cosmos or universe; therefore, the two extremes "Heaven and earth" express totality.
In verses 12 and 13, Paul contrasts Jewish Christians with the newly adopted Gentile Christians. The "we who first hoped" are the children of Israel/Jews who were in covenant union with God since the time of the Patriarchs. Yahweh set them apart from the Gentile world as a unified, holy people in the Covenant at Sinai (Ex 19:3-8; 24:3-7). It was to them that God first promised the Messiah, and they were the first to hear Jesus's Gospel of salvation during His earthly ministry. With the coming of the Holy Spirit at the Jewish Feast of Pentecost, it was the faithful remnant of old Israel who became the ministers of Jesus's kingdom of the "new Israel" (CCC 877) that is His Church. The Jews like Paul of the renewed and spiritually transformed Israel have carried the Gospel of salvation to "you also," the Gentiles in the Church's congregation at Ephesus.
Paul wrote that Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians are now One Body in Christ (Rom 12:4-5), "sealed" (verse 13) by God the Holy Spirit in the Sacrament of Baptism (CCC 1272-74, 1280). The "seal" of Christian Baptism is the "first installment" (verse 14) or down-payment by God on the promise of complete and eternal salvation. Paul also wrote to the Christians at Corinth: But the one who gives us security with you in Christ and who anointed us is God; he has also put his seal upon us and given the Spirit in our hearts as a first installment (2 Cor 1:21-22).
The Gospel of Mark 6:7-13 ~ The First Missionary Journey
of the Twelve Apostles
7 He summoned the
Twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over
unclean spirits. 8 He instructed
them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick, no food, no sack, no
money in their belts. 9 They were,
however, to wear sandals but not a second tunic. 10 He said to them, "Wherever you enter a house,
stay there until you leave from there. 11
Whatever place does not welcome you or listen to you, leave there and
shake the dust off your feet in testimony against them." 12 So they went off and preached repentance. 13 They drove out many demons, and they anointed
with oil many who were sick and cured them.
This event was the first time Jesus sent the Apostles out into towns and villages to preach with His authority. They could take three items:
The Apostles were forbidden to take food, a sack, money, or a change of clothes. The list of items is slightly different in the accounts of similar missions in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. The differences may reflect other missions where the journey was made somewhat harder by forbidding them to take even sandals or a staff that was necessary for protection against wild animals or robbers. While they could take a staff on the first mission, they had to rely on God to provide for their food and lodging. After their first experience gave them confidence, Jesus may have made their dependence on God even greater in forbidding the protective staff or sandals. The absence of sandals may indicate God has hallowed the ground upon which they walked (see Ex 3:3; Josh 5:15) since the Kingdom of God will now encompass the whole earth. The Jerusalem Temple was "holy ground," and the priests were forbidden to wear sandals as they went about their ministerial duties (Mishnah: Tamid, 1:1Q-1:2J; 5:3).
In Luke's Gospel, Jesus sent the 70 disciples out by twos with the same mission (Mt 10:5-15; Lk 9:1-6; 10:1-12). In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus instructed the Apostles not to go into pagan territory or Samaria but only "to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" because Jesus's first obligation was to those who were already in covenant with God, the descendants of Jacob-Israel. Jesus probably sent them out by twos for three reasons:
In verses 7 and 12-13, Jesus gave them the power to cast out demons and heal the sick. He also gave them the authority to call the people to repentance in preparation for the Kingdom of Jesus Christ, like St. John the Baptist. His kingdom would be inaugurated on Resurrection Sunday and embraced by the New Covenant faithful at Pentecost. Jesus does not give them the authority to preach the Gospel of salvation or forgive sins. That authority will come later, after His Resurrection, when God reveals the fullness of His divine plan (Jn 20:22-23). Sending out the Apostles and disciples on missionary journeys will be the first of many such missions; notice St. Mark says He "began to send them out" (verse 7). Jesus was preparing His Apostles and disciples to carry on His mission to spread the Gospel of salvation after His Ascension, and, in this first mission, He sent them out to begin in a small way.
10 He said to
them, "Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave from there. 11 Whatever place does not welcome you or listen
to you, leave there and shake the dust off your feet in testimony against
them."
The missionaries of the Gospel are to stay in the same
house to avoid causing jealousy within a community by having villagers compete
in offering them hospitality. To welcome Jesus's Apostles is to receive Him and
His message of salvation, but refusing to listen to His emissaries is to refuse
to listen to Jesus and reject His gift of eternal life (see Mk 8:38 and 9:37).
If a town does not welcome them, they are to leave and "shake the dust" of that
place off their feet "in testimony against them." Shaking the dust of the
unreceptive town off their feet symbolizes an act of repudiation as well as a
solemn warning that those who reject the message of Jesus carried by the Apostles
reject Him (Acts 13:51).
12 So they went
off and preached repentance. 13 They
drove out many demons, and they anointed with oil many who were sick and cured
them.
The Church continues to fulfill this same ministry and
acts of mercy which Jesus commanded the Apostles to offer in their first
mission. The Church's ministers continue to anoint the sick with oil and
petition God to cure them in imitation of the Apostles in the Sacrament of
Anointing and with the same authority Jesus gave His Apostles (see Jam 5:14-15 and
CCC 1510-11, 1526). And the Church continues to offer the same spiritual and physical
healing according to the will of God through the power of the Holy Spirit in
the other Sacraments that are Jesus's gift to His Church.
Catechism References (*indicated Scripture quoted or
paraphrased in the citation):
Psalm 85:11 (CCC 214*);
85:12 (CCC 215, 2795*)
Ephesians 1:3-14 (CCC 2627*, 2641*); 1:3-6 (CCC 381*, 1077); 1:3 (CCC 492, 1671); 1:4 (CCC 492*, 796*, 865*, 1426, 2807*); 1:4-5 (CCC 52*, 257); 1:5-6 (CCC 294); 1:6 (CCC 1083); 1:7 (CCC 517*, 2839); 1:9-11 (CCC 2823); 1:9 (CCC 257, 1066, 2603, 2807*); 1:10 (CCC 668, 772, 1043, 2748*); 1:13-14 (CCC 706, 1274*); 1:13 (CCC 693, 698, 1296*); 1:14 (CCC 1107*)
Mark 6:7 (CCC 765*, 1673*); 6:12-13 (CCC 1506); 6:13 (CCC 1511*, 1673*)
The disciples share in Christ's healing mission (CCC 1506*, 1507*, 1508*, 1509*)
The Church called to proclaim and bear witness (CCC 737*, 738, 739-740, 741*)
The origin and scope of the Church's mission (CCC 849*, 850, 851*, 852-856)
The mission-mindedness of the Church (CCC 1122*, 1533)
The Holy Spirit as God's guarantee and seal (693*, 698*, 706*, 1007*, 1296*)
The Virgin Mary is a unique example of being chosen "before the foundation of the world" (CCC 492*)
Michal E Hunt, Copyright © 2015; revised 2021 Agape Bible Study. Permissions All Rights Reserved.