Reading
14 After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. 15 “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”
16 As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. 17 “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will send you out to fish for people.” 18 At once they left their nets and followed him.
19 When he had gone a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John in a boat, preparing their nets. 20 Without delay he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.
Meditation
«The time has come. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!» (Mk 1:15). This is the essence of Jesus' message. The reference is to the fulfillment of the messianic promise contained in the Old Testament.
With Jesus the age of the Law ends and the age of grace - obtained through faith - begins. A new covenant is sealed by God with humanity. This is the "gospel": the good news, which God communicates to man through Christ's saving work.
The closeness of the kingdom of heaven is the closeness of Christ himself, who will exercise God's sovereignty, establishing peace and justice on earth and in heaven. With the advent of Jesus, with his preaching, death and resurrection, we have entered the eschatological era, the last times; a new perspective has opened up to humanity, revealing a new goal towards which we are all projected. The circularity of time has been broken, and the human history and our individual existences now find in the announcement of the kingdom a liberating perspective and fullness of meaning.
The means that Jesus chooses to establish his kingdom are humble and considered of little account by the world: he could have set up a school of theology; he could have assembled an army to fight Israel's oppressors; but he chooses common men, to establish the kingdom through preaching.
Jesus chooses his disciples not among the scholars of the Sanhedrin, but among the fishermen on the shores of the Lakes Tiberias (which the Jews called the "Sea of Galilee"). At the moment of their call these men leave everything: family, job, companions; a radically new life begins for them. Yet they will not remain "empty-handed"; Jesus promises them: «Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or fields for my sake will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life.» (Mt 19:29).
There is a certain continuity between what the disciples are before their calling and with their function in the service of Jesus: they were fishers of fish, now they will be fishers of men. The following of Christ does not mortify our nature, our gifts, what distinguishes our personality. Rather, it enhances all these aspects bringing them to full maturity.
Here is the "completeness" of the kingdom, the harmony of its construction, which has Christ himself as the "cornerstone" and in which we are built together to become God's dwelling through the Spirit (Eph 2:20-22). The conversion to which Jesus calls us becomes an opportunity to turn our gaze within ourselves, where we can find the original image of the Logos, capable of restoring and bringing our humanity to its fullness.
Prayer
Make us attentive, Lord, to your voice that calls us from the depths of our hearts; so that we can obey you, participating in the establishment of your kingdom of peace. Amen.
- Rev. Dr. Luca Vona
