Third Sunday of Ordinary Time [A]

January 26, 2020

Matthew 4:12-17

After the arrest of John the Baptist, Jesus begins His public ministry. Jesus left Nazareth, His hometown, and moved to a more crowded and bigger town, Capernaum. Crudely speaking, Jesus did urbanization. This strategic move of Jesus was to support His mission. With a dense population and with better access to neighboring towns, Jesus could minister to more people in a more efficient way.

However, Jesus’ movement from Nazareth to Capernaum is not just about practicality and preaching strategy. Jesus was fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah. “Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali…the people who sit in darkness have seen a great light…” For many of us, Zebulun and Naphtali do not make any sense, and we tend to skip these verses. Yet, for the first-century Jews, this prophecy is a game-changer because God will gather the lost twelve tribes of Israel, and re-establish the Kingdom of Israel.

Let us go back to the Old Testament a little bit. In 2 Samuel 7, God promised that the throne of David will last forever, however after the reign of Salomon, David’s son, the kingdom of David was divided into two. After some hundred years, these two kingdoms, one by one, were destroyed by the enemies, and the twelve tribes were scattered among the Gentiles. Among the tribes of Israel, only Judah, and Benjamin were able to return to the land of Israel, while the rest, including Zebulun and Naftali, were lost. Jewish people in the time of Jesus knew well that one of the missions of the expected Messiah is to restore the Kingdom and to gather the lost tribes of Judah.

Jesus, the Messiah, came indeed to fulfill this expectation, and no wonder if the first thing He did was to preach that the Kingdom of God is at hand. It is called the Kingdom of God because it is the Kingdom promised by God, built by God, and governed by God. It is the restored kingdom of David, and much bigger than the first David’s kingdom.

However, there is a fundamental difference between David’s kingdom and Jesus’. David’s kingdom was established to fight Israel’s enemies. His kingdom was filled with nobilities, generals, and armies. It was characterized by political rivalry, a struggle for power, and treachery. Finally, it is no different from other kingdoms in the world. All is about “game of thrones”. And like other earthly kingdoms, the kingdom of David was bound to crush as well.

The Kingdom of God basically goes in the opposite direction. It is the Kingdom built upon faith in God, service, and love for others, even to the point of sacrifice. When we were baptized, we become the members of this Kingdom, and in fact, we are transformed into the children of God, calling Him as our Father. However, despite being heirs to the Kingdom, we are not princes, lords or generals. We are servants and lovers. The higher our positions in the Kingdom, the more love and service we shall render. That is why the priests do not have wives, because they are busy serving the people! No wonder St. John of the Cross would say, “in the twilight of life, God will not judge us on our earthly possessions and human success, but rather on how much we have loved.”

Valentinus Bayuhadi Ruseno