Fr Marco Lazzaron
he Apostles are sent by Jesus and to him they return; the same happened to all other religious missionaries in the Middle Ages. They are like the bloodstream in our bodies in its systolic and diastolic movements. Jesus is the “heart” of all Christians.
Mark does not mention that the messengers did extraordinary things or miracles. They return to Jesus because, as for us, now and then in our lives, we need to check our guidelines, we need to “audit” our being Christians. The Twelve returned to Jesus to verify their actions to see what worked and what needed to be changed. Ultimately, however, they also come back to share, to tell. This makes us feel united and intimate. Sharing is not the chronicle of what happened but expressing feelings and emotions. It means exposing yourself and showing yourself.
Jesus listens to them, he lets them speak. Here is perhaps the most beautiful definition of prayer: it is the delivery of our story, the story of what we live, feel and think. God already knows everything, obviously, but he loves to hear the things he already knows about us, from us. Every day we should find time to tell God about our days, our hopes, our fears. We would realize that we are not alone and that by telling someone about our emotions, we often obtain the grace to understand their meaning. Prayer doesn’t change our life, it changes us. Prayer changes our hearts.
The disciples are tired and Jesus listens to them, and tells them to rest: “Come away by yourself, to a deserted place, and rest a little”. Jesus understands that his people are tired. For Him, the person came first, not the results obtained and when he gets off the boat, his gaze falls on the toil of men, on their poverty. He is interested in what you are, not what you do. It is a gesture of love from someone who simply wants humanity to be happy.
But at a certain point, there is an unexpected event: the crowd that has been following Jesus for days reaches him or rather arrives before him on that deserted shore of the lake. When he got off the boat he saw a large crowd and had compassion on them. Yes, they are unbelieving people, who seek Jesus with ambiguity, but for Jesus they deserve compassion. Jesus is moved when he sees his people without a shepherd.
How nice to see that Jesus changes his plans, not those of his friends. He chooses to renounce his rest, not that of the apostles. He had had mercy on the apostles who returned tired and had called them to rest, and now he has mercy on the crowds and interrupts his own rest. Only mercy guided him. What does he offer to the crowd? His compassion, he feels pain for their pain. Before giving the bread, Jesus gives the Word, to satisfy the men and women who follow him. Jesus’ gaze was a gaze full of tenderness: he loved first with his eyes and then with his gestures. He looked with love and then acted. He knew that it is not pain that man fears but being alone in pain, experiencing it without the comfort of a friend. “What we can do is just a drop in the ocean, but it is this drop that can give meaning to our whole life” (Mother Teresa of Calcutta).