Homily for 8 May 2016

8 May 2016

One of the benefits of the internet is that it gives us a look into the minds of people.  And one thing we see is that a lot of people have Jesus all figured out.  It doesn’t seem to matter what the issue is, there’s always the underlying theme of : “This is what Jesus said.  End of discussion.”

Of course, we see this in Scripture as well.  People think they have God all figured out, even the disciples sometimes.  And so, they’re not interested in what Jesus has to say.  Either that, or they’re trying to listen to Jesus, but they still don’t get it.  And what they don’t “get” is that Jesus always has more to show them.

Jesus always has more to show us; he has more to tell us about . . . everything under the sun (and everything over the sun, too!).  And that’s an exciting thing!  And Apollos knew something of that excitement.  As we heard, “with ardent spirit, [he] spoke and taught accurately about Jesus.”  But “he knew only the baptism of John.”  And so, when Priscilla and Aquila had more to tell him about “the Way of God,” he wanted to know more.

Jesus speaks in “figures of speech.”  As we’ll hear in Monday’s readings, the disciples said, “Oh, no.  We got it.  You’re speaking plainly enough.”  To which Jesus said, “Hold on, you have more to learn.”  And Jesus says something similar to us: We always have more to learn—and that’s an exciting thing.  There’s a whole world of truth and goodness and beauty the Lord is trying to keep our eyes open to see.

And so, let’s take a lesson from Apollos, from the Apostles, and from all the billions of faithful and interested followers of Jesus throughout time.  Let’s see what Jesus has to show us.  Like a bunch of 3-year olds, let’s keep pummeling the Lord with questions.  There’s always more to know and love.  With Jesus there’s always more.