Help Wanted – The Laborers Are Few
Homily on “Help Wanted – The Laborers Are Few” based on the Gospel of Matthew 9:36-10:8:
In today’s Gospel, we have Jesus looking at the crowd and His Sacred Heart being moved with compassion because they were troubled and abandoned, helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; pray therefore to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest."
This Gospel reading is not only relevant to call for vocations or only for those called to priesthood or religious life. This passage is for all of us - what it means to be a Christian, a follower of Jesus, and what our mission is … to invite others and to lead them into the kingdom of God… using the words of the Gospel – we are being called to be laborers for the Lord and also to recruit, so to speak, more workers for the Lord….
Continuing with that analogy – if we are responding to any Job Opening or HELP WANTED ad – we will probably want to ask certain questions about the job.
1) What is the nature of the work? What kind of business is God in and what will I be expected to do?
Jesus is still in the same business that he has been in for two thousand years. It hasn’t changed, and it is not going to. His business is helping people.
Sometimes we seem to think that the work of Jesus is concerned primarily, if not entirely, with spiritual things, matters that pertain to the soul. But this is not true at all. You see, if we think about His ministry - He was concerned not only with the souls of men, but also with their minds and bodies.
Yes - He forgave sin, but He also healed the sick, he taught the unlearned, he comforted the broken hearted, he fed the hungry, he befriended the lonely. Wherever he found any kind of person with any kind of need, he went to work because his business was helping people. It still is. That is the nature of the work if somebody were to ask you or if you yourself are not sure – helping people.
2) A second question one might ask about the job is: What are the qualifications?
In this age of technology, one reason many people have difficulty getting a job is because they lack the necessary skills to do the work. That kind of limitation will never disqualify you for God’s business. Of course, Christ needs doctors and nurses and lawyers and teachers who will help him with his work, but these are by no means the only helpers he needs. You remember in the Gospels, Jesus was also looking for someone who knew how to give a cup of cold water in his name.
The only real qualification for God’s business is to care. You can have all the skills in the world, but if you do not care, you are still not qualified.
That is why St. Paul said in his letter to the Corinthians: If I speak in human and angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith so as to move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing.
On the other hand, your skills can be very limited, but if you have a heart to care and a will to try, there is a place for you in God’s business. I guess what we are saying is that the job application only contains one question: Do you care? Do you know how to love? If your answer is “yes”, then you are qualified.
3) Then there is the third question one would probably ask about the job: Where is it located? Where does the work take place?
This is another problem area for unemployed people. They lack transportation, and the available jobs are often so far away that they cannot get to them. But here again, you will not face this problem when it comes to what Jesus is calling us to. You do not have to travel half-way around the world or even catch the cross-town bus to find a place of service. There are people who need to be loved, and relationships that need to be reconciled, and hurts that need to be healed right where you are.
You see - We tend to believe that the work of Jesus takes place primarily, if not exclusively, at the Church. And this simply is not true. God’s business is not limited to any particular time or any particular place. We come to the church; we come to Mass, we worship, we hear God’s word, and are nourished by His Body and Blood, then we are sent to go and serve the Lord through others at home, at school, at work – wherever there are people who are in need.
So – we have found out the nature of the job – helping people; the qualifications – that we need to care; regarding the location or place – no need to commute – wherever we are – where there is a need.
4) Then there is one other question that is usually asked by a job applicant. How much do I get paid? What is the salary?
At this point, we have some good news and some bad news. The bad news is that working for Jesus does not pay too well in terms of dollars and cents….. because the primary motivation to serve others must not be to enrich ourselves financially or for our own agenda or our own business because that is not loving people, that is using them.
“If you help someone and expect something in return, that is not kindness, that is business.”
“The world is in chaos because things are being loved and people are being used.” … the other way around.
Jesus said to his disciples, “You have received without cost; now give without charge.”
Now – here is the good news… if we follow Jesus. there is a sense in which loving people is the highest paid job in the world. For one thing, you will get a sense of personal fulfillment. You will have the satisfaction of knowing that you have risen above selfishness, that you have become a real person – fully human and that you have learned to live for someone and something other than yourself….. and my brothers and sisters – my friends – that is worth more than gold… no matter how high the value of the gold is right now.
And last, but not least, you will gain the approval of Jesus. It probably will not be a big thing – no trumpets blaring, no testimonial dinners – to honor you, no headlines in the paper, just a quiet voice on the inside that says, “Well done, my good and faithful servant.” If you can go to bed and go to sleep with that sense, you, my friends, are the richest man or woman in the world… richer than the owner of Tesla, who is now a ‘trillionaire”.
Remember Jesus’ sermon called the Beatitudes which mean true or authentic and lasting happiness or "blessedness"… being in the "kingdom of God/heaven".
The fundamental message of the Beatitudes is simply this: Happy are those who work for the coming of the Kingdom of our heavenly Father; happy are those who by their lives reflect the love and goodness and mercy of the Father; happy are those who serve their fellow human beings in Jesus’ name;
- Happy are those who put up with difficulty, trouble, confusion, - those who bear with frustration, disappointments, conflict, weariness, exhaustion in the service of God and others… for the love of God.
There is no way to put a price tag on genuine Christian service.
Jesus is telling us to proclaim: “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
As Christians, we are the presence of the Kingdom of God and are called to help others to get also into the Kingdom of God.
“The harvest is plenty, but the laborers are few.”
The question is: Are you IN?
God bless…
