The Fifth Sunday of the Apostles’ season 

The Church put in front of us the following readings:

 

*First reading from Isaiah (1:21-31)

“The faithful city,” which is referred to as Jerusalem, representing the entire kingdom of Judah. God compares the actions of his people to an adulteress. The people had turned from the worship of the true God to worshiping idols. Their faith was defective, impure, and diluted. Idolatry, outward or inward, is spiritual adultery, breaking our commitment to God to love something else. 

God promised to refine his people similar to how metal is purged with lye on a smelting pot. This process involves melting the metal and skimming off the impure dross until the worker can see his image in the liquid metal. We must be willing to submit to God, allowing Him to remove our sin that we might reflect His image.

Throughout the Old Testament, the oak tree has been a symbol of strength and was chosen as a place for pagan worship. But God’s people had joined the idol worship associated with these trees. This passage wants the people of God to make Him their first loyalty; everything else will fade in time and burn away under his scrutiny.

 

*Second reading is from 1 Cor ( 14:1-19)

The ability to prophecy may involve predicting future events, but its primary purpose is to communicate God’s message to people, providing insight, warning, correction, and encouragement. St. Paul’s words to the Corinthians about tongues and prophecy have much to say to our generation. Many Christians struggle with the discussion of tongues. Paul would clearly state that no one should put down those Christians who speak in tongues, and those who speak in tongues should not disparage those who do not. Paul makes several points about speaking in tongues: it’s a spiritual gift from God, it’s a desirable gift even though it isn’t a requirement of faith, and it’s less important than prophecy and teaching. Believers need unity and love. The enemy is not one other but the sinful world. Make sure your actions are encouraging and informative.

As musical instruments must play each note for the music to be recognized, so Paul says it must be preached in the hearers’ language in order to be helpful. Because there are many languages globally (14:10), people sometimes can’t understand each other. It is the same with speaking in tongues. Although this gift is helpful to many people in private worship and helpful in public worship with interpretation, Paul says he would rather speak five words that his hearers can understand than ten thousand that they cannot.  

 

*Third reading is from Luke (12:16-34)

Luke wants to tell us through this passage, which begins with the parable of the foolish rich man. What the proverb indicates is that the rich man's calculations were all wrong. That is why his hopes were dashed. The rich man thought that the rich would have a wellspring of happiness in which there is no shadow. But satisfaction slipped away suddenly. This is how he who puts his hopes in riches be, even if he does not die suddenly, like the proverbial rich man. Happiness based on earthly goods does not deserve a person to make it the goal of his life and existence. We do not need the idea of ​​death to say this! 

A person who trusts in earthly goods is like pagans. Man's life is not conditioned by what he possesses. It is more than food and clothing. All the interests of the earth are in the service of life, but life transcends it: it is in the relationship of the Son to his Father, with God knowing what we need.

Does this mean that we have to live in an ideal and unreal world, waiting for everything from God's wondrous intervention? No. A Christian does not belong to the world. He does not care about riches like the pagans. Only he lives in the world. The Christian life involves a tension between two ambiguous views of the world. Wealth is not evil in itself. It may help us acquire treasure in heaven if we put it in the service of our neighbor in the form of charity or assistance. But wealth is dangerous because it exposes man to the attachment to it and seeks it for his own sake, that is, for the sake of selfish earthly pleasures like the Pharisees (Luke 16/14) or as the foolish rich man.

Whatever the case is, money should not take the first place in a Christian's interests. He must work for the sake of the kingdom of God, that is, for the glory of God and the salvation of humankind.