Ambassadors for Christ are about God’s business

When I was young, it seemed like I was always getting in trouble. Not trouble with a capital T, but lowercase T trouble.

Like the time when I was in second or third grade and my friend and I went exploring in a swampy area not far from my house. We were explicitly and repeatedly told by our parents not to go near the swamp because of hazardous sinkholes. Of course this only piqued our appetite for adventure.

I remember coming home after one such escapade and my dad immediately yelled at me about my disobedience by going into the swamp. I insisted that my friend and I were only walking through the woods – as I stood before him covered up to my neck in mud because, well, I fell into a sinkhole.

There were other instances, too, such as leaving the house on a Saturday morning before cleaning my room like I was told; exploring an abandoned shack that my friends and I were told not to go near because it was “dangerous,” or telling a little fib about misbehaving in school and not remembering that my dad and the principal were good friends. He always found out everything.

This was always followed by a lecture from my father and the punishment: grounded for the weekend, or worse, no TV for a week.

I remember as part of those lectures, my father would often tell me how my behavior reflected on not just me, but on my parents and our whole family. When I was in school or out and about in the neighborhood, I represented our family’s character and our family’s values.

Saint Paul tells us in his Second Letter to the Corinthians, that “we are ambassadors for Christ, as if God were appealing through us.”

As ambassadors, we are Christ’s representatives. Heaven is our home, God is our father and we are out and about in the neighborhood. So, we must always show our Catholic character, how we represent God, how we represent God’s family, and how we represent God’s values through our words and our actions and by serving one another, forgiving one another, showing mercy to one another and loving one another.

It’s also important to remember that, as an ambassador, we are not just a representative, but a diplomat credentialed through the Sacrament of Baptism and strengthened in our mission to continue Jesus’ mission by the graces received from the sacraments.

As ambassadors of Christ, as Christians, every deed we do should be a righteous deed. It’s what makes us different; it’s what makes us counter-culture; it’s what sets us apart in our service to others.

Remember, atheists run soup kitchens, too.

While many non-believers are certainly driven to serve by a sincere compassion to help others, there is an enormous difference between what we Christians do to care for our neighbor and what secularists do.

We are about God’s business. Many who serve others in the community do so as a check-off on a to-do list, a blurb on a resume, an attention-seeking post on social media or, frankly, just to feel good about themselves.

What we do is in tandem with and support of God’s desire for the world, not our own. We don’t follow our own personal idea of what the world, what society, should look like. We follow God’s. And by following God’s vision for our world, we are concerned with so much more than meeting material needs of others; we are about the needs of the eternal soul. We are living out Christ’s healing mission by sharing God’s love with others.

We can do this by asking ourselves, “Where is God in what I am doing?” That means that prayer needs to be the foundation of all of our activities.

Almsgiving without prayer is merely a courtesy. Fasting without prayer is just a diet. Prayer keeps our words and our actions, our intentions, centered on God, so that the more prayerful our life is, the more we are aware of God’s call, his plan, his purpose and his promise.

This Lenten season, as ambassadors of Christ, let’s not only practice prayer in word but in deed. Let’s make our alms giving, our fasting, every action, no matter how monumental or how miniscule, a prayer to help us ensure that our business is God’s business.

Deacon Dean Johnson serves at Church of the Holy Family, Sewell.