Friday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Jeremiah 3:14–17
The word “return” that we hear today means repent.
It is a word familiar to most of us.
It means:
change your mind,
change your direction,
and return to the Lord.
God’s call to repentance reveals His character.
An indifferent god would not care about our behavior.
But the God of the Bible is not indifferent.
He cannot accept that His people misbehave, because He cares.
His call to repentance is the voice of a Father who sees His children walking toward danger and calls them back.
And the fruit of repentance is blessing.
In today’s reading, that blessing is very concrete.
The Lord promises to give His people
“shepherds after my own heart,”
shepherds who will guide them wisely and prudently.
This promise matters.
It was the leadership of ancient Israel that brought the people toward the disaster of the year 586 BC.
The fall of Jerusalem was not only a military tragedy.
It was also a spiritual tragedy.
Bad shepherds had led the people badly.
They had failed in justice.
They had failed in truth.
They had failed in fidelity to the Lord.
So behind Jeremiah’s promise there is a dream.
The dream of a leader who would finally give Israel what Israel had always hoped for:
justice.
This dream is beautifully portrayed in the famous passage from Isaiah 11.
There, the ideal king is filled with the Spirit of the Lord.
He does not judge by appearances.
He defends the poor.
He brings justice to the weak.
And under his reign, society and even creation begin to return to the peace of Eden.
No more injustice.
No more violence.
No more war.
For those who met Jesus by the shore of the Lake of Galilee, this dream began to become reality.
Jesus is the Shepherd Jeremiah promised.
Jesus is the King Isaiah saw from afar.
He is the leader Israel dreamed about.
And not only Israel.
He is the leader the whole world has been waiting for.
In Him, power is not used to dominate.
Power becomes mercy.
Power becomes healing.
Power becomes forgiveness.
He does not crush the weak.
He lifts them up.
He does not protect His own comfort.
He gives His life.
He does not lead people into fear.
He calls them into the freedom of the children of God.
No wonder so many were drawn to Him.
The sick came.
The sinners came.
The poor came.
The lost came.
Those who had been pushed aside came close to Him.
And this remains true even today.
Many people may have objections to the institutional Church, but none has a “problem” with Jesus.
There is something special about Him that is difficult to describe.
Every movie,
every book,
every course about Jesus tries to capture that something,
but it never does.
Yet it is precisely that something that keeps drawing people to Him.
And those who have come to Him love to say:
“The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I shall want.”
For He is the Shepherd after God’s own heart.
The Shepherd we were waiting for.
Biblical Reflections on the Gospel of Matthew
Scripture Attribution
New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993
the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of
Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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