For What Purpose?
Why are you here? What’s your purpose for being here?
Are you here because you have to be?
Are you here because your parents made you go?
Are you here because it’s your Sunday obligation?
Are you here because you want to receive the Eucharist?
Are you here for help or rest?
Why are you here?
We live in a culture that so utilitarian that at times, we can risk making our faith utilitarian. We live in a culture that says, “What do I get out of it?” “What’s in it for me?”
The words of John F. Kennedy a few decades ago now seem foreign to us: “ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”
Why are you here? Are you here because you want to know what God can do for you? Or are you here because you want to know what you can do for God?
This is what the whole first reading from the book of Job is all about. It was kind of strange was it not? If you were paying attention, the end of the first reading said: “I shall not see happiness again”… The Word of the Lord… to which you responded: “Thanks be to God!”
Remember what the Book of Job is about: It’s about a wager between God and Satan. Satan says that Job doesn’t really blameless and upright because God had provided him with family, land and livestock. It is because of the blessings and gifts of God that Job was righteous.
And thus the whole book of Job is the trials that Job undergoes and how he perseveres through it all with the Lord.
I think that’s the wager we have today: Am I here simply because of what God has blessed me with? Or is it because of something else? What happens when there is suffering and trials in my life? Does my faith waver?
Now don’t get me wrong, I think it’s good to be here to give thanks and praise for the blessings of God, but the reality is, that life isn’t always like that. Some days you feel like Job, lying in bed with months of misery and troubled nights saying, “When shall I arise? Then the night drags on; I am filled with restlessness…”
And perhaps you do not currently feel this way, but if we look around, if we look at the other members of the Body of Christ, I’m sure we can find someone that is…
Why are you here?
In our lives of faith, there are actually stages of maturity just like in life. There is the childhood stage, the adolescence, and adult stages.
In the childhood stage, God and our faith is a set of rules and rewards. And you and I in this stage are very much worried about “what I want.” And so when we go to pray, when we go to talk with God, its’ often about what God can give me or sometimes what God can give to someone else.
For those in spiritual childhood: I do good so I can get a reward: blessings, heaven, etc.
Then comes the spiritual adolescence: This is the awkward stage. This is where you begin to try to live your faith not because of the rules but because it is good or you feel it’s who you are. So then there’s those awkward times when you’re in public, and you’re about to eat… and you do the sign of the cross… Or when someone talks about doing something perhaps not very Christian and you shrink in your place…
For those in spiritual adolescence: I have faith because it defines me. Because it is who I am.
But spiritual adulthood is where it is not about what I get out of it, and it’s not about who I am, but it’s about who God is. I no longer do what I do because of what I get out of it, or because it defines me, but simply because God is God.
Just like when your child grows up and matures into an adult, or at least one hopes that their children matures into an adult, but what you should notice is that your relationship will change. Now that a child is an adult, your relationship is no longer about what you do for them, it’s no longer about who he is, but instead you find that now that they are mature they can love you simply because of who you are. Because you are father or mother.
It is the same with God. Our relationship with God should mature as well. It shouldn’t just be about what he gives you.
So “why are you here?” Hopefully simply because of who God is, who Jesus Christ is for you.
But if this is so, then you’d know that Jesus Christ came and gave us a mission.
Did you know that the word “Mass” comes from the Latin word “Missa”? And “Missa” is related to the word “missio,” which is the root of “MISSION”.
My brothers and sisters, we have a mission. We have a mission to preach the Good News. And in Matthew 28, Jesus gives us the great commission: Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
This is why were are here. We are on a mission for Christ. If the reason why you’re here is not because of this, then perhaps you are wasting your time. Because your time here should contribute to this mission. It should help clarify how you are to accomplish this mission, and it should give you strength to go out and execute it. Pope Francis called the parish a “field hospital,” which I think he was referring to the church being open to receiving all those who are wounded and hurting in sin. But I also think it’s important that a “field hospital” is a military analogy. It is a temporary structure in the middle of a field for those who are fighting for a mission.
In the readings today, we find this awareness of the mission. St. Paul in the second reading is also on the same mission for Christ and for the gospel. Because of that he says that he is willing to make himself a slave to all, to make himself weak, to make him all things to all people. Why? In order to “win over as many as possible.” To complete the mission. Simon’s mother-in-law, immediately after being healed, began to serve and wait on the Lord. Jesus says, “For this purpose I have come.”
Today, the call for us is not look for what God or the church can do for us, instead what are we doing for the mission of Christ?
