Rejection is a painful experience that we encounter. It is stressful, and the feeling of depression comes next. Many of us have missions to do after this. In today’s gospel, Jesus handles his posture as a human being and how he manages himself after being rejected by his hometown.
There are two types of rejection: one is rejection by God, and the other is rejection by humans. The rejection by God is alarming because it may wreak havoc on humanity. It is not a judgment; rather, it is an act of God to teach humanity. The Jews believed that rejection of God happened to them many times. For instance, when they become unfaithful to God, they believe that God will punish them. Abandonment is not the purpose of God; instead, God judges them harshly and forgets them. Because God does not break His promise to them, even the Jews break. Second, the rejection by humans is quite inhumane because it has harsh judgments against fellow humans. This happened in our gospel today, in which Jesus was rejected by his fellow Jew. The people of Nazareth were questioning the integrity and dignity as well as the authority of Jesus as a rabbi and messager of God. In response, Jesus cured the sick people as expected, and they were unbelief of what Jesus did.
For us, rejection is a painful one; in fact, it is an indirect judgment. After we did many things or helped our village, many of them were unbelieving of our sincerity to do good for them. They pretend that everything we did to them has personal motives or interests for us. This is a form of rejection; even our intention is clean. However, backstabbing or saying many things wrongly about our personal traits and attributes is an indirect judgment for us. In response, many of us divert our hands to focus on our relatives and other people outside of our community rather than our village. Apostle Paul reminds us that we need to provide for our members of our household because once we denied them, we denied the faith and were considered unbelievers (1 Timothy 5:8).
In Jesus response to the rejection, he fulfills his mission to establish the reign of God by teaching, out-casting the unclean spirits, and sending his disciples to other villages. The apostles are carrying out the task for Jesus to be cheerful and careful when handling the unbelievers because they are considered the people of God. Jesus authorized his disciples to cast out the demons and cure and anoint the sick.
After being rejected, this is a way to overcome the psychological impact of the rejection. We need to be active in fulfilling the mission that God has assigned to us. Whatever the vocation that we are willing to do, God knows it. There is no need to be choosy in determining the type of task that we should carry out. These are the basic tasks every believer should do: teach the commandment of God; learn to be prayerful at all times; have a duty to forgive so that they will forgive us too; and have learned the duty of diligence so that we can provide generously to others (Matthew 28:20).
Currently, the administration has never fulfilled its promise to the Filipino people. They got 31 million votes in the 2022 national election and are now rejected by many Filipinos because their promises are broken. Instead of reacting negatively to the bashing of many Filipinos, they need to work overtime to serve the Filipinos and fulfill their promises. According to the Pulse Asia survey, the most urgent concerns of Filipinos are controlling inflation, increasing the pay of workers, reducing poverty, creating more jobs, and providing subsidies to those who lost their jobs and livelihoods. Unfortunately, those concerns are set aside by the administration. They are focusing on the parties at the Palace, travels abroad, people’s initiatives to change the constitution, and war propaganda posture against China. This is a sign of laziness, and there is no sympathy for those concerned. Many Filipinos are dying due to high inflation, the diminishing rate of the peso, and the impeding conflict with China. In such a way, we are in dire need of fulfilling our duty as a prayerful nation in this scenario. God never forsakes the Filipino in this time of distress. We strongly believe in it.
Finally, we are a Christian-dominated nation calling for the unity of all Filipinos to protect our culture, tradition, and sovereignty. Don’t put our nation in jeopardy by educating them about disunity, waging war with China, and presenting an artificial economic situation. The administration sold the nation to the United States in order to stay in power. This is not the mission of a Christian nation. We need to unite for the common good and not for the interests of the administration to stay longer in power. We need to preach with honor, testify against their wrongdoings, and drive out evil forces (Mark 6:10–12). As believers, let’s bind ourselves to the name of almighty God.
Prayer
Oh God, please allow us to unite in times of distress and uncertainty. Our country is afraid of another war. Unite us according to your will. War is not on your agenda; rather, peace is ultimate for all of us. And this is your reign that comes to us forever. Amen.
