Vigils Reading – 14th Sunday ORD

THE LORD OF THE HARVEST

From a commentary by St Augustine

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The gospel for today raises a question. When the Lord told his disciples

that the harvest was indeed abundant but laborers were scarce and urged them

to ask the Lord of the harvest to send laborers out to harvest his crop, which

crop did he have in mind? That was the point at which he increased the group of

twelve disciples whom he had named his apostles by the addition of another

seventy-two, and his words make it clear that he sent all these out to gather in

the ripe grain.

But which crop did he mean? Evidently not a crop of Gentiles, from whom

there was nothing to be reaped because there had as yet been no sowing among

them. The conclusion must be that the crop in question consisted of Jews. The

Jewish people were the harvest to which the Lord of the harvest came, and to

which he dispatched his reapers. To the Gentiles he could send no reapers at

that time, only sowers. We may understand, then, that harvest time among the

Jews coincided with sowing time among the Gentiles, for out of the Jewish crop,

sown by the prophets and now ripe for harvesting, the apostles were chosen…

For the seed to sprout it was sufficient for the prophets to sow, but the ripe grain

had to wait for the apostles’ sickle…

Then the reapers were sent out, wielding the gospel as their sickle. They

were to greet no one on the road, which meant they were to have no aim or

activity apart from proclaiming the Good News in a spirit of brotherly love.

When they arrived at a house they were to say: Peace be to this house. This

greeting was no mere formula; being filled with peace themselves, the apostles

spread it abroad, proclaiming peace and at the same time possessing it.

Consequently when one of them, fully at peace with himself, pronounced the

blessing: Peace be to this house, then if a lover of peace were in that house, the

apostle’s peace would rest upon him.