Liturgical Colour : White
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to the words of the Scripture we are all told that the Lord has revealed His truth to us through Christ, His Son, Our Lord and Saviour. Through Him, the Lord has revealed what His desire is for all of us, the promise of eternal life and happiness with Him, through which He has called on all of us to be turned into a people of the Light, to be saved and freed from the chains of sin and evil that had bound us all these while.
The Lord said to His disciples in our Gospel passage today that He shall reveal everything to them, and in due time the truth would all be revealed, and all would know everything that He has brought into our midst, the whole truth of God’s love and wonderful grace. He also said how He would go to the Father and ascending to Him, referring to His Ascension after He has risen from the dead. Thus, all these then has been fulfilled when He ascended into Heaven at the fortieth day after His glorious Resurrection.
And while He has ascended into Heaven, He did not leave all of His faithful ones behind without any guidance or help. On the contrary, through the gift of the Holy Spirit, the Lord has not just revealed the fullness of His truth, but also gave great wisdom and guidance to all of His disciples and followers, encouraging and strengthening them all at the time of a great trial and a most challenging and crucial moment, as the faithful were facing great opposition from the Sanhedrin, the Jewish High Council and its members of authority.
Through the Holy Spirit, the Apostles and the many other disciples began to establish a firm foundation of the Church as they went from many places to places, spreading the words of truth and the Good News of God to more and more people, to the Jews and the Gentiles, or the non-Jewish people alike. More and more became convinced to follow the Lord and to entrust themselves to Him, and as we heard in our first reading today, the Church expanded greatly due to the efforts of St. Paul and others like the charismatic Jewish preacher named Apollos.
Apollos was likely one of the followers or even a disciple of St. John the Baptist, as it was mentioned that he was only familiar with the teachings and the baptism of St. John. He was eloquent and very charismatic, and made a large following among the Jewish diaspora throughout many parts of the Mediterranean. As mentioned in today’s first reading, some of the women among the believers, Priscilla and Aquila, both of whom were Roman names and were therefore Romans, noticed that Apollos did not have the fullness of truth that they themselves had received from the Apostles.
As a result then, we heard the very curious and interesting encounter, how two Gentile women, Priscilla and Aquila, revealed the fullness of truth to Apollos, a Jew, which was quite unusual in those early days of the Church, as the Apostles and most of the earliest disciples of the Lord were Jewish, and initially there were only few disciples from among the Gentiles. However, thanks to the efforts of St. Paul and other disciples who went on missionary journeys with him, as well as the efforts from others, many Gentiles came to accept the faith and the Holy Spirit descended on all of them as well.
We see here the great beauty of the Church, how its members help one another to seek the truth of God, sharing in the gifts of the Holy Spirit to those who have not yet known the Lord and His truth, just as Priscilla and Aquila revealed the truth to Apollos, whom having received the truth and enlightenment, then went on to proclaim the truth as most courageous missionary of the Christian faith to more and more people, bringing even more souls back to the Lord and His salvation.
Through all these we have heard today from the Scriptures, we are therefore reminded as those who have received the truth of the Lord, His love and salvation through the Church, that each and every one of us have also been called to be evangelising and missionary disciples of the Lord, that is to proclaim His truth and Good News at every possible opportunity. It does not mean that we need to go to foreign and faraway places as the Apostles had done all those years ago, or that we have to do amazing and wonderful actions.
Instead, it is at our every little and small actions that we glorify the Lord, through our sincere and most genuine efforts, in showing our faith by our actions, committed to the Lord, in walking down through His path and obeying His commandments, in showing love for Him above all other things, and in showing the same love to our fellow brothers and sisters, especially to those who are in need for love and compassion, mercy and help. We are all called to do our best at even the smallest opportunity, working together so that through all of our actions, we may come to glorify the Lord all the more.
May the Lord be with us always, and may He strengthen each and every one of us with the courage and the guidance, the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, which we have received, and share as the members of the same one Church of God. Let us all devote ourselves, our efforts and attention, to serve the Lord at all times, to be good Christians not just in name only but also in our words, actions and deeds, at all times. May God bless us all, now and always. Amen.
petercanisiusmichaeldavidkang 