Our gospel for today is taken from Luke 24:35-48. This Gospel reminds us that even the apostles or followers of Jesus experienced how their expectations caused them their frustration. Being with Jesus for almost three years, the apostles expected Jesus to be the king of Israel with all His glory and fame. They expected that if Jesus would be a king one day, they could also have a better place in His kingdom. They expected that as the Public Satisfaction Rating of Jesus grew higher, they too could enjoy the privilege of being popular as His friends or companions. But in just a second, every expectation they had sunk with them when Jesus was crucified and eventually died on the cross. Prior to this, Judas betrayed Jesus. Peter denied Jesus three times. Then after Jesus was buried, all the other disciples hid themselves with shame and fear. They lived in frustration. I say they lived in frustration because when a person is frustrated, he/she has a hard time to listen and believe. He/she refuses to hear some good news from anyone including his friends. He/she is impervious or callous, showing no concern of what is happening about the world. Is this not the experience of a woman who faithfully loves her man who is unfaithful to her? Is this not the experience of the parents who thought their children were good yet they ended in jail because of drugs? Is this not the experience of children who are abandoned by their parents as they decided to separate ways? With all these analogies, I say the apostles lived in frustration when they knew they could not reach anymore their expectations. Yet the Gospel does not end in the apostles ' frustration. It tells us how Jesus came to change the ending, from the tone of frustration to the recognition of a divine expectation. The Gospel tells us that Jesus came before the apostles and greeted them saying "Peace be with you!" Then He began to explain everything to them. He said -- "Thus it is written that the Messiah would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things." These words of Jesus simply mean that the apostles should not dwell on their frustration but to rise up from such situation in order to meet God's expectation; It is the time for them to ask what God wants them to do and not what God must do for them. This is also the message that we must get from this Gospel: though we fail in many ways, we fall on our knees due to our broken dreams, we become frustrated and irritated, still God has a divine plan for us and He expects us to fulfill it. We have to testify that in our failure, God is still successful. We have to testify that even in the midst of frustration, we can pursue God's divine expectation -to keep our faith.
To end, I would like to share to you the story about St. Alphonsus de Liguori.
St. Alphonsus was born of noble parents, near Naples, in 1696. His spiritual training was entrusted to the Fathers of the Oratory in that city, and from his boyhood Alphonsus was known as a most devout Brother of the Little Oratory. At the early age of sixteen he was made doctor in law, and he threw himself into this career with ardor and success. He was one of the best lawyers. A mistake, by which he lost an important cause, showed him the vanity of human fame, and determined him to labor only for the glory of God. He entered the priesthood, devoting himself to the most neglected souls; and to carry on this work he founded later the missionary Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer. My dear friends, St. Alphonsus's experience of failure and then frustration did not prevent him to do great things for the glory of God. So I encourage you to meet God's expectation for us to be His living witnesses. Let us keep the faith. Amen.
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