God’s call is a mystery and the true understanding of it goes beyond the human person. It is a mystery because how God’s call comes to be, whom God chooses to call, when He chooses to call whoever He chooses to call, and why God calls the least expected (humanly speaking) can only be understood by God. Again, when God chooses to call, He does not count on our unworthiness; neither does He look at our shortcomings. His call overrides our human weakness and limitedness. These indices are clearly seen manifested in our readings today.
Today being the fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C, in our readings, we see the demonstration of God’s call first in the life of the prophet Isaiah. Again, we see the call extended to the Apostles – Peter, James, John, and Paul, “the least of the Apostles.” (cf. Is. 6:8-9; 1 Cor. 15:9; Lk. 5:8) In the first reading, taken from Prophet Isaiah, we see the perfect demonstration of the love of God on the prophet Isaiah. We see the demonstration that God does not call the perfect. He rather calls the imperfect and makes him perfect; the impure and makes him pure; the unworthy and makes him worthy. Isaiah’s call is recorded in Isaiah 6:1-13. It took place in the year of king Uziah’s death, 742BC.
The opening theophany is a vision of the heavenly court, with the Lord sitting on the throne, high and lifted up, with the hem of robe filling the temple. When Isaiah saw the Lord, he knew what kind of man he was. The more clearly he saw the Lord and the Seraphim, the more clearly he saw how bad his state was. Isaiah said “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (cf. Is. 6:5). Despite Isaiah’s unworthiness, the Lord prepared him, touched and cleansed his mouth with a burning coal.
That gesture purified Isaiah a man of unclean lips and made him worthy for a special assignment. Then, Isaiah heard a question: “whom shall I send?” in response to which he expresses his availability in the words “Here I am, send me.” (Is. 6:8b). Dear friends in Christ, the call of Isaiah was benched on his proper disposition and the willingness of his heart because God may call but he does not force us to respond to his call. God calls and allows us to freely respond to the call. In this manner, like the prophet Isaiah, though unworthy we are, God has called each and every one of us, priests, religious, men and women for specific assignments; first to demonstrate his love to those around us – our neighbours, colleagues, partners, associates, the poor, the neglected, and the marginalised.
Second, to be bearers of His love, and most importantly, He has called us to be Proclaimers of His word. The demonstration of this expensive love of God on the prophet Isaiah, a man of unclean lips, we see portrayed in our second reading (1 Cor. 15:1- 11) when the apostle Paul confessed his unworthiness, but then was found worthy by God’s grace. Despite his ugly past where he persecuted the Church, the body of Christ, God was still merciful and delighted in him, focusing on his strength and passion with which he persecuted the early Christians, then converting such strength and passion to instruments of evangelisation and proclamation of His word. This implies that our strengths which sometimes are negatively channeled could be converted and redirected by God for His mission, for the proclamation of His word, to the greater glory of His name. Again, in the Gospel (Lk. 5:1-11), we see the demonstration of God’s love on Simon Peter, and then James and John who were partners with Simon.
They were fishermen whom Jesus transformed into becoming fishers of men. Despite the unworthiness of Simon, having complained about his predicament and why he felt the order of Christ was impossible, Christ still turned his situation around, making him to catch a great shoal of fish, and transforming him to a fisher of men just at a point when he was at the verge of giving up and quitting. The grace of God counted Simon worthy and elevated him from a man who catches ordinary fish to a man called to catching men for Christ.
With this unmerited but grace-filled call, like Isaiah and Paul, Peter came to the realisation of the fact that the call of God is not predicated on the weakness of man; that despite our unworthiness in the course of the manifestation of our human weakness, God sees this, finds strength in our weaknesses, and turns them around for the greater glory of His name. Peter himself attested to this when he said “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” (cf. Lk. 5:8) Therefore, the readings of today draw our attention to the fact that the call of God is not predicated on our worthiness or holiness of life. God calls us even in our human weakness. He sees beyond our human weakness, and where he finds weakness, there he also finds strength.
The call of God is based on God’s choice through his grace that counts us worthy. Again, we are made to understand that as Christians, just like Isaiah, Paul, and Simon Peter, we must make ourselves readily available and properly disposed to God’s call, and acknowledge our shortcomings that Christ may transform us. God purified the lips of the prophet Isaiah because he properly disposed himself for God to purify his lips. Same with Paul, Simon and the other disciples whom Scripture says left everything and followed Christ. So, every day of our lives, in our various vocations and respective fields, whether as priests and religious, doctors, lawyers, teachers, politicians, civil servants or traders, we must dispose ourselves to being worked upon and transformed into good Christians.
It is important for us to know that as children of God, God does not look at our human weakness before He calls us, but rather in the proper disposition of the state of our minds. We therefore ask God for the grace to be properly disposed, and for the grace to promptly respond to His call, and be used as vessels of evangelisation, that one day, we may come to enjoy with Him in heaven where His voice shall echo to us “welcome, my faithful servants.” May God who through His power cleansed the lips of the prophet Isaiah cleanse our unclean lips and fill us with the necessary graces needed, that we may surrender ourselves wholly to Him saying “Here am I, send me!”
• Rev. Fr. Patrick Akotonayon, Associate Parish Priest, St. Michael Catholic Church, Lafiaji, Lagos.
