Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Cycle A)
Lectionary: 97
Reading 1 - 2 Kings 4:8-11, 14-16a
Responsorial Psalm - Psalm 89:2-3, 16-19
Reading 2 - Romans 6:3-4, 8-11
Alleluia - 1 Peter 2:9
Gospel - Matthew 10:37-42
Welcoming Christ, Welcoming the Cross ...
LESSON: The Cost and the Welcome
My brothers and sisters in Christ, today's Gospel ends a long discourse in Matthew chapter 10, where Jesus has been preparing his disciples for mission. He has warned them about persecution, about division, even about being hated for his name. And now, at the very end, he gives us these striking words: "Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me… whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me."
These are hard sayings. They almost seem to contradict everything Jesus teaches elsewhere about honoring father and mother, about loving our neighbor, about the sanctity of family life. So what is going on here?
Jesus is not telling us to love our families less. He is telling us that our love for him must be the source from which all other loves flow. When Christ holds the first place in our hearts, every other relationship is actually purified, strengthened, deepened. St. Augustine put it beautifully when he taught that our loves must be rightly ordered. Disordered love, even love of good things, becomes destructive. Rightly ordered love, with God at the center, becomes life-giving.This is a particularly relevant message in our day. We live in a culture that is busy, scheduled, and full of competing claims on our time and our affections. Careers, children's activities, civic responsibilities, even good and noble pursuits can quietly slip into that first place in our hearts. Jesus is not telling us to abandon these things. He is telling us that none of them can bear the weight of being our ultimate love. Only He can.
LESSON: Taking Up the Cross
Then Jesus says something even more challenging: "Whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it."
The cross, in the first century, was not a piece of jewelry or a decoration on a wall. It was a brutal instrument of execution. When Jesus tells his disciples to take up their cross, he is asking them to be ready to die for him. But he is also telling them something deeper. He is telling them that the path to true life runs directly through self-denial, through letting go, through surrender.
St. Paul understands this completely in our Second Reading from Romans. "Are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?" Paul asks. For Paul, baptism is not merely a ceremony of welcome. It is a real participation in the dying and rising of Christ. Through the waters of baptism, we have already died with him. We have already been buried with him. And we have already begun to live a new life with him.
This means the cross is not something foreign that gets imposed upon us from the outside. The cross is the very pattern of Christian life. It is who we already are. Every time we choose Christ over comfort, every time we forgive when we want to hold a grudge, every time we serve when we would rather be served, we are living out the death and resurrection that began at our baptism.
Paul says, "Consequently, you too must think of yourselves as dead to sin and living for God in Christ Jesus." That word "think" is important. It is a deliberate act of the mind, a conscious recognition. We have to remind ourselves daily: I am not who the world says I am. I am not defined by my failures, my anxieties, or my accomplishments. I am defined by Christ, in whom I have died and risen.APPLICATION: The Hospitality of the Shunammite Woman
Now, in our First Reading, we meet a remarkable woman. The Shunammite woman of 2 Kings notices that Elisha, the man of God, passes through her town regularly. She does not just give him a meal. She goes to her husband and says, "Let us make a small room on the roof… so that when he comes to us he can stay there." She creates space. Permanent space. She makes room for the prophet in her home and in her life.
And what happens? Through her hospitality, she receives a gift she had not even dared to ask for. The prophet promises her a son.
The Shunammite woman shows us what Christian welcome looks like. It is not extravagant. It is not flashy. It is a small room, a bed, a table, a lamp. But it is permanent. It is intentional. It is a real space carved out for God's presence in the midst of ordinary life.
How do we make such a room in our own lives? In homes that are often crowded with schedules, in minds that are often crowded with concerns, in hearts that are often crowded with worries, how do we build that little space on the roof where Christ can dwell?
It begins with a decision, much like the Shunammite woman's decision. She did not wait for the perfect moment. She did not wait until her house was bigger or her life was less complicated. She acted. She built.
For some of us, that room is built in the daily commitment to prayer, even just ten minutes of silence before the day begins. For others, it is the Sunday Eucharist taken not as an obligation but as the center around which the whole week is ordered. For still others, it is the quiet decision to welcome a neighbor, to invite someone who is lonely to dinner, to give that cup of cold water to a child, a coworker, or a stranger.
APPLICATION: Finding Life by Losing It
Notice what happens to the Shunammite woman. By making room for the prophet, she receives life. Literally. A son is born to her. This foreshadows what Jesus promises in the Gospel: "Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it."
This is one of the great paradoxes of the Christian life. We are so often convinced that holding on tightly is the way to keep what we love. We grip our schedules, our possessions, our plans, our relationships, afraid that if we let go, we will lose everything. But Jesus tells us the opposite is true. It is in the letting go, in the offering, in the surrender, that we actually find life.St. Thérèse of Lisieux understood this in her "little way." She taught that holiness is not found in grand gestures but in small acts of love offered with great trust. A cup of cold water. A kind word. A quiet sacrifice. These are the materials with which God builds a soul.
The Invitation Today
So as we gather around this altar today, let us ask ourselves a few honest questions.
- Where in my life am I holding on too tightly to something or someone, putting them ahead of Christ?
- What cross is Christ asking me to take up right now, perhaps a cross I have been resisting or trying to set down?
- What kind of "room" am I building in my life for God's presence? Is it a guest room he visits occasionally, or a real dwelling place?
- And who is the "little one" that Christ is sending into my path, the one to whom I am called to offer even just a cup of cold water in his name?
A Final Word
The Christian life is not about doing extraordinary things. It is about doing ordinary things with extraordinary love, because Christ dwells in us and we dwell in him.
May we, like the Shunammite woman, have the wisdom to recognize God's presence passing through our lives and the generosity to make room for him. May we, like Paul, live each day in the conscious awareness that we have died with Christ and risen with him. And may we, like the disciples Jesus sends out, take up our cross with courage, knowing that whoever loses his life for Christ's sake will surely find it.
And may the peace of Christ, which surpasses all understanding, guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.
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