Homily for Tuesday of the 22nd Week in Ordinary Time Cycle II
Theme: The Spirit of Jesus expels, challenges and terrorizes contrary spirits in us.
By: Rev. Fr. Callistus Emenyonu, cmf
Homily for Tuesday September 1 2020
READINGS: 1 Corinthians 2: 10-16, Ps. 145, Luke 4: 31-37
It can be said that everything has a spirit that controls it. This is not to enter into any propounding of an ideology of Spiritism; by this I mean to say that there is a power that controls everything. This power can be a natural force or mechanism of operation of a thing. The human being in a higher sense of it is made with the infusion of breath of the Spirit of God. This was what gave him life and ability of locomotion, power of thought and imagination. This Spirit of God has always controlled the affairs of each person and that of the world. Even when man proves obstinate and misdirects or changes the Spirit to the bad or evil one, yet God’s Spirit reigns supreme and has power to intervene and change things at its own time and will. He may allow the contrary spirit to operate but at the time God wills, it ceases to be. All the spirits that are not of God knows this and they fear him as such.
Beloved, the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. This is the submission of St Paul and it is true because it comes from God and has to return back to search for God and reunite with it. It is from the depth of God that the true Spirit operates. This is why only God knows man through and through because his Spirit gets into every aspect of the being of man and nothing can be hidden before it. It is only by possessing the Spirit of God and retaining that which was given us at creation that we can comprehend the thoughts of God and know his will for us. This same Spirit of God helps us to know the gifts he has bestowed on us and how to utilize them. The Spirit of God speaks in us not just in mere words but in more practical actionable ways that is enriching and irresistible. The unspiritual man does not understand anything of the spirit and so knows nothing about God and his gifts; everything for him is folly and material. It is only those with the spirit of God that posses the mind of God and can speak for God to listen and converse freely with him.
Beloved, this spirit when possessed and nurtured and put into good use makes all powers to tremble. This is true because what St Paul said to the Philippians would happen: That at the name of Jesus every kneel bows and all tongues confess Jesus as Lord (Master). It is the Spirit that is in us that makes the pronouncement of the name of Jesus powerful. It is that same Spirit of Jesus that all other spirits see even from a distance and begin to tremble and feel challenged. The force of the Spirit in Jesus gave his teaching authority and power which makes every ear that hears it remain sober and troubled till it succumbs to its demands.
This is why the people who heard him in Capernaum and the city of Galilee felt and confessed his authority which is devastating and irresistible, it erodes the foundation of a being that is not founded on him. It is this Spirit that the man with unclean spirit which is contrary to that of Jesus was unable to contend and withstand. Because it was more powerful that what it has, it got into torture and painfully cried for liberation from the force of the power that is tormenting it. It recognised the higher power in Jesus and knew that it has the power to destroy it and so went into pleading for leniency.
Beloved, we are not to be amazed like them at what the Spirit of Jesus could do rather be more convinced that it can do more with and in us should we believe and maintain what we have received. The spirit we received is of power and might not of timidity and it has right to call God Abba, Father. Let us recognise that what is in us is greater than what is outside of this world and use them appropriately in accordance with God’s will.
We pray that the Lord would retain the spirit he has infused in us and power it daily in us. We ask for his grace never to be afraid of lesser and unclean spirits but to use the Holy Spirit in us to terrorize and dispel them wherever we encounter them, may they fear us and not us fearing them, Amen.
HAPPY NEW MONTH AND WELCOME TO SAFE EMBER MONTHS
Rev. Fr. Callistus Emenyonu, cmf