Sunday Homilies with Fr. Mike Schmitz - 5/19/24 Gift and Mystery: Use the Gift

Episode Date: May 18, 2024

Homily from Pentecost Sunday. The best way to thank the Giver is to use the gift. At Pentecost, the Lord poured out His Holy Spirit upon the disciples and blessed them with His gifts. Immediately, they used those gifts. These gifts were given to be used. And so are all of the gifts God continues to give. Mass Readings from May 19, 2024: Acts 2:1-11 Psalms 104:1, 24, 29-31, 341 Corinthians 12:3-7, 12-13 John 20:19-23

Welcome to Sunday homilies with me, Father Mike Schmitz. I hope today's homily inspires and motivates you, and I also hope that it leaves you hungry for the one who gave everything to feed you. If you want to get this in other Sunday Mass resources sent straight to your inbox, sign up at ascensionpress.com slash Sunday, or by texting Sunday to 33777. You can also follow or subscribe on your podcast app for weekly notifications. God bless. The Lord be with you.

He reading from the Holy Gospel according to John, chapter 20 verses 19 through 23. On the evening of that first day of the week, when the doors were locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, peace be with you. And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit.

Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained. The gospel of the Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ. Wait you to have a seat. So I've got two brothers-in-law, and one of them, I think I made one of them mad once. Actually, no, I know I made one of them mad once. It was not too long ago. Actually, it was a while, a few years ago.

It was a Christmas time. And what happened was Christmas Eve happened, I think it was Christmas. We had gone to Mass and we had come back home and we were downstairs and my parents were all there. I'm like all my siblings, their spouses, the kids, all the nieces and nephews are all around and there was presents. And at one point, my mom said, hey, Mike, go over in that behind that door. There's a present. And in behind that door, there was a bike. And it's almost a full grown person. This was like five years ago.

So, but I got a bike for Christmas, which is awesome because I hadn't gotten a bike for Christmas ever since I was, I think, 12 years old. I wrote it, it got stolen. Whole long story, another time. But there was a bike. It was a fat tire bike. It was so cool. It was mountain bike. It was awesome. And I pulled on like, oh my gosh, this is insane. This is incredible. This is amazing. And I thanked her. She said, do you like it? I love it. And she said, do you want, well, do you think you'll use it? And I said, no. She's like, are you serious? I was like, yeah, yeah. No, it's really great. She said, you don't like it. No, no, no, I really like the bike. I just don't think I'll use it. Because like, here's the thing. Right now, literally we're in a garage. This is the

garage. This is where I would normally store a bike, but you can't store a bike in a garage that's become a chapel. So, like, I'm like, I just, I love the bike. And I'd love to be able to like, say, maybe one day I'll use it. So this, I'll just bring it up to the house and keep it in the garage. But there's literally, there's no place in here. No place to keep the bike. And so she's like, oh, okay. So my mom, she loves the fact that if you don't like a gift, she, you tend to tell her that. She's like, that's what I want. I'd rather know. The problem is this. The problem is, my brother-in-law had been tasked with the task. He'd be given the task of getting the bike,

which meant that he had to drive from my hometown, which is Braynor, Minnesota, about two, two and a half hours south to the Twin Cities, twice to pick up the bike. He went down once to make sure it was right size and all these things came back, and then went down and picked it up again and came back. He had gone, he kind of bent over backwards

to get this bike for me. He was like, are you kidding me? You don't want this bike? And he was so ticked. It took him a while to cool down. But it was one of those situations where I'm like that this is, the thing. When you're given a gift, there's two things you can do. Two things, two ways you can

express gratitude. One is by saying thank you. And that's what I did. I was, I genuinely, I was very touched that my parents thought of getting a, you know, at the time, what, 44-year-old person, a bike. And it was a great bike. So one of the ways we can say thank you when we're giving a gift, given a gift is to thank, literally say thank you. The other way we can express gratitude when we're given a gift is to use the gift. In fact, I would say the best way to express gratitude when you're given a gift is to use the gift. We started a series last week, last Sunday, talking about gift and mystery. We know that the Lord God promised to send the Holy Spirit.

God promised to give us the gifts of the Holy Spirit and actually give himself in the Holy Spirit. And yet that gift is not just for ourselves. Remember we talked about this last weekend? That the gift is actually meant to build up the people around us, is meant to actually build up the body of Christ. And so today, on Pentecost, here is the Lord Jesus, who pours out His Holy Spirit. I mean, think about in the gospel today. Jesus breathes on the apostles and says, receive the Holy Spirit, those who sins you forgive

are forgiven them. Now, they're meant to go out and use that gift. That's one of the reasons why it is a massive gift as a priest. To be able to hear confessions and give absolution, that is one of the best things, one of the best parts of every single day, is to be able to administer and give God's spirit of reconciliation to anyone who, wants it, anyone who needs it. Because to be able to forgive sins, but not to forgive sins, is to waste the gift. And here's the question. How many of us spend so much of our lives?

I'm grateful for the gifts. Lord, God, thank you for the gift of eternal life. God, thank you for the gift, your Holy Spirit. Thank you for whatever the gift it is you've given me. But we waste the gift because we don't use the gift. Say, I'm really grateful for it. I'm thankful for it. I love having it. But the best way we can express thanks is by using it. the gift. And we see that in the Acts of the Apostles as well. Right here, here is, here's the day of Pentecost and the apostles are gathered together with Mary and the other disciples, and they're praying for the promised Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit comes upon them. And it wasn't one of those situations where like, wow, this is amazing. We got the Holy Spirit. Yes, we do. We got

that. It's a situation where they're like, we have the Holy Spirit. Let's go out. How many times have you ever been in a situation where there's been a time of prayer? And you're like, man, that was awesome. And you just sit with it. Now sometimes that's okay. As opposed to, here's the... Imagine what the apostles would have done if they would have experienced this outpouring of the Holy Spirit, that felt this power of the Holy Spirit,

this courage of the Holy Spirit, these words of knowledge, this gift of being able to go out into the world. But they were like, this feels so great, let's just stay in this huddle. I think too often we might find ourselves in that holy huddle. Right? I mean, in football,

they have this thing called the no huddle offense. The no huddle offense is basically, you don't even get into the huddle, you just get to the line and go. That's kind of fun. That's great because you just get to the line and just do the play. I think too many Christians, we have a no-offense huddle. Where we get into our huddle, we went to church, we get out of prayer in the Holy Spirit,

but then we don't actually get to the line. We're like, hey, we got in the huddle here on Mass on Sunday, already break, and we just go to the sidelines, and I'll see you back in the next huddle. I'll see you back in next Sunday Mass, as opposed to the reality is we come here to receive the Holy Spirit, to receive God's power so that we can go out.

Again, to not live the no-offence huddle, but to actually thank God and praise God by using the gifts he's been given us. He's given us. In fact, later on in the Acts of the Apostles, I think it's Acts chapter 4. What happens is, here's Peter and John. They've been given the gift to the Holy Spirit.

And so they go to the temple. On the way into the temple, it says that there's a man who was lame, a man who was paralyzed. And he was sitting outside the temple begging. And Peter and John stop and look intently at him, scripture says. and the guy thinks they're going to give him some money. And Peter says, yeah, we don't have money.

We have gold or silver, we have none. What we do have will give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ, I say to you, rise and walk. Now, this is so cool because the guy, the way that Luke describes this and acts of the apostles is just so powerful. It says this. Immediately his feet and ankles grew strong. He leaped up, stood, and walked around, and then went into the temple with them, walking and jumping and praising God. And that might sound like a small detail.

But imagine not being able to walk, not being able to stand, not being able to leap, not being able to jump. What would you do if you were able to walk? What would you do if you were able to walk? What would you do if you were able to leap? What would you do if you're able to jump? You just, you couldn't get enough enough of leaping, of jumping or of walking. You just, you had, you were unable to move. And now all of a sudden you have the ability to move as he's walking into the temple. And he's leaping and jumping and running around.

The very act of using the gift, praises God. The very act of him standing. When God gave him the gift of legs that work now. The very act of walking, because God gave him the gift of legs that work now. The very act of leaping, that praises God. And this is the same thing for us. This isn't just about the gift of the Holy Spirit, about wisdom and understanding and counsel and knowledge and piety and fear of the Lord.

it isn't just about the gifts of healing because the Lord God does want to pour out on his people the gift of healing. This isn't just about a gift of being able to evangelize or the gift of being able to do mighty works in Jesus' name. This is even about the gifts of being able to see. The gift of being able to speak. This is about the gift of actually being able to, some of us can't do this, but some of us can actually get out of bed and stand. See, all of us have at our fingertips We have God's gifts. And many times we're thankful for them, right? Many times, God, I thank you that I can stand.

God, I thank you I can see. God, I thank you that I can hear. God, I thank you, that I know that you're my father and I can talk to you anytime I want. But the best way to thank God is by using his gifts. If we don't use the gifts that he's been giving us, we are wasting his gifts. But if we do use his gifts,

we are praising his name. Let me just realize this. As often as you and I do the simplest things, saying, God, the only reason I can do this is because you've given me this gift, that praises him. Even, you don't even have to do it in church. When it comes to, again, walking, leaping, standing, sitting down with somebody, listening to them.

God, I'm going to use the gift of hearing to listen to someone who has some problems. God, I'm going to use the gift of the time you've given me to spend on someone who needs time. God, I'm going to use the gift of legs to go for a walk today. And to realize this is the truth on this Pentecost, this reality of the gift and mystery, whenever we use the gift, the mystery is, God is praised. This is the last thing. One of my favorite movies of all time is called Cherites of Fire. It was the Academy Award winning movie in 1980, so it's really, really, really.

old. And also, if you are not into track, it's really, really boring. It's the slowest movie in the world. But it tells a really compelling story. Part of the story is about a man named Eric Little. Eric Little was Scottish and he was a Christian. Eric Little, later on, after the Olympics, he's about his Olympic race. After the Olympics, he actually went to become a missionary in China. He actually became a martyr. But before that, he was an Olympian. And if you know anything about his story, is that he was the number one seed in the world for the 100 meter dash. but they were running the 100 meter heats on a Sunday and since Eric Little saw running as his job, that was his occupation,

and refused to work on Sunday. He said, I can't run the heats on Sunday. So he dropped out of the 100 and went into the 400. He was still pretty fast. And at one point, there's a scene in the movie where his sister is telling him, Eric, why are you running? Like, Eric, you know you're made for the missions.

Like, go to the missions. Why are you wasting your time doing this athletic thing? why are you wasting your time going to the Olympics? Why are you wasting your time running? And that's so often we can maybe think that that's the thing. Is that God's given me gifts, I have to use them for only holy things. But Eric Little says something so powerful, so profound, and so true. And he looks at his sister and he says,

I believe that God made me for the... He says, I know God made me for the missions. But he also made me fast. And when I run, I can feel his pleasure. This is the reality for every one of us. Some of your gifts, you'll be used in church. Some of the gifts that God poured out on you will be used to build up the body of Christ.

But there's other gifts that just, God, just wants you to use them because when you use them, the giver of the gifts is glorified. So today, if you look around at nature, God, thank you for the gift of sight. You're using your eyeballs. glorifies the giver of the gifts if you can go for a walk

if you can go for a run if you can just ride your bike if you can just even sit for a moment without pain even that that glorifies the giver of the gift the mystery is God has filled our lives with gifts

the tragedy is too often those gifts go unused but the glory is As often as we do use His gifts, not only do we praise God, but in that moment, we can also feel His pleasure.