Charles Dickens wrote a novel called Great Expectations. It's about a boy named Pip who came from a poor, lower-class family in a small English town. He had no hope of ever leaving his surroundings, getting a good education, and amounting to something. He seemed doomed to a life of poverty.
Then, one day, Pip was playing in the hills outside his town, and he suddenly met up with an escaped prisoner who was in desperate need of help. Pip went out of his way to help him. Months later, a...
Charles Dickens wrote a novel called Great Expectations. It's about a boy named Pip who came from a poor, lower-class family in a small English town. He had no hope of ever leaving his surroundings, getting a good education, and amounting to something. He seemed doomed to a life of poverty.
Then, one day, Pip was playing in the hills outside his town, and he suddenly met up with an escaped prisoner who was in desperate need of help. Pip went out of his way to help him. Months later, a lawyer from London knocked on the door of Pip's home. He informed Pip's family that an anonymous donor arranged to send him to London to be brought up in an upper-class home and given the finest education.
From that moment on, Pip's life changed most remarkably. He was rescued from a life of poverty and given a life of hope and opportunity.
Years later, when Pip was a successful businessman living in a fine London home, a dirty, lower-class workingman knocked at his door. Pip treated him rudely and tried to get rid of him. The man was the prisoner that Pip had befriended years before.
This same man was the anonymous donor who rescued Pip from his life of poverty and ignorance and made possible the life of wealth and education he enjoyed. The man had used all of his resources to see that Pip was educated and living well, and he was so proud to see that Pip had, indeed, done very well.
That story is a kind of parable of Jesus and each one of us. Sin had doomed us to a life of slavery and despair. We were without any hope. We had nothing to which we could look forward.
But then came Jesus. He rescued us from that doomed life and gave us a life of freedom and spiritual opportunity. Everything we are, and have, and enjoy today, we owe to Jesus who bought it for us at the price of His own life.
Now we find ourselves in Pip's position. Just as he became aware of how much he owed the man at his door, so we are aware of how much we owe Jesus. And just as Pip suddenly faced an important decision, so do we: How will we use our new life of freedom and opportunity? How will we show our gratitude for all that Jesus has done for us?
And this brings us to today's Gospel reading. Like Pip, each of Jesus' Apostles had to decide what they would do with their new life of freedom and opportunity and how they would show their gratitude to Jesus.
Each one, except Judas, decided to commit to Jesus and to commit his life to the task of completing the work Jesus began. And so, Jesus prayed to His Father for them, asking Him to protect them and saying, "As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world."
Our presence here in this Church, celebrating the Eucharist, today says that, like the Apostles, we, too, have decided to cast our lot with Jesus. We, too, have decided to commit our lives to complete the task that Jesus began. And so that same prayer that Jesus prayed for the Apostles almost 2,000 years ago, He prays for us. Just as He sent the Apostles into the world, so He sends us into the world to complete His task on earth.
Let us close with the words from today's second reading: "Beloved, if God has loved us so, we must have the same love for one another… He has given us His Spirit. We have seen for ourselves the love God has for us."+
