Today’s Scripture Readings

‘Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But at the judgement it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum,
will you be exalted to heaven?
No, you will be brought down to Hades.

‘Whoever listens to you listens to me, and whoever rejects you rejects me, and whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me.’

Jesus confronts the indifference of hearts that have witnessed ‘his deeds of power’ and yet refuse to repent and accept his message.

Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum were towns in Galilee where Jesus performed many miracles, yet they remained largely unresponsive. Tyre and Sidon, Gentile port cities, like Nineveh in the Book of Jonah, are portrayed as being more open to repentance.
Familiarity, it seems, breeds complacency. So too, it is so easy for us to dismiss the power and action of God at work in our world and go about our lives untouched by the call to deeper discipleship and repentance.

Often, we can be critical of those who proclaim the Good News because their words challenge our comfort; we dismiss their corrections as ‘none of their business’ and label their preaching as ‘boring’ and ‘irrelevant’. A word of caution from Jesus tells us that rejecting the word of those who proclaim the Gospel, is tantamount to rejecting Jesus and ‘whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me.’

Cultivating a contrite heart and being open to the challenge of God’s Word from the most unlikely of sources is a way to stay humble and receptive to what God might be asking of us. May we recognise and treasure ‘the deeds of power’ occurring around us and speak in awe of God’s love and mercy for us. Amen.