During today’s Reading from the Gospel of Mark, we heard how the Lord Jesus served God the Father in obedience and humility. Jesus came on earth to do His Father will and obeyed to the end. “He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death – even death on a cross.” He did not come as a King but as a humble servant in human flesh.
Jesus went to His hometown and taught in the synagogues. As we heard in today’s Gospel, few believed in Him because they personally knew Him. Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.” So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them. He was amazed at their lack of faith. Because of their lack of faith, the grace of God could not manifest itself through Jesus. Very few were healed.
How often during His ministry did Jesus say, “If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me? But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.”
Surely, the people from the hometown of Jesus had heard of the great miracles He was performing throughout the country. Surely, it must have been obvious that the grace of God was at work through Him. If only they would have believed that God the Father was manifesting Himself through Jesus, would that not have been sufficient faith for numerous cures? But no, the unbelief of the people was limited to their worldly perception of the human nature of Jesus. Refusing to believe in the Son of God, the grace of God did not manifest itself upon them through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Today, there are similar circumstances in our world. When in need of a healing through the anointing of the holy oils, many people search for a charismatic priest who is alleged to perform miracles. During this time, they have no faith in the grace of God and the power of the Holy Spirit that is manifested through their own local priest who has the authority from Jesus to administer the Sacrament of the Sick in the Church.
People forgot that priest, who administers the Holy Sacraments of the Church, is the instrument of the Lord Jesus. While the priest is visible at the ceremony of Baptism, during the Consecration of the bread and wine or during the Sacrament of Confession, Jesus is also present, He being the One who is administering the Sacraments. Jesus is manifesting Himself through the priest during the Sacraments.
My brothers and sisters, as Jesus obeyed and served the Father in humility, the priests, and all of you are also called to obey and serve the Lord in humility. As the power of the Spirit of the Father was manifested through Jesus Christ, so it is in the Holy Church, be it through the priest who is administering the Sacraments, teachers who are teaching in a classroom children and youth and people who work for the parish. We should humbly believe in the grace of God the Father and the power of the Holy Spirit that is manifested through the sacraments, the priest, and people who come to the church to pray, sing, and work.
With this belief, spiritual knowledge, and understanding our faith will bring us to the realization that God is manifesting Himself all around us, in ways that we have never seen before.