“Am I ready to Shake the Dust from my Feet”

Gospel Thoughts

14^th Week – Thursday

(Gospel – Matthew 10: 7-15)

 Am I ready to Shake the Dust from my Feet”

1)  The phrase “Shaking off the Dust from your feet” appears to be very appealing to all of us. In fact we do not want to have any dust in our feet. It is the normal practice that as soon as we feel that our feet is full of dust, we either shake off the dust or we wash our feet

The purpose of both these actions is one and the same, that is to clean our feet and to free ourselves from the dust

This is the normal and literary meaning of the phrase. Can we have any other deeper meaning to this phrase other than this?

It is possible to read into this phrase another level of meaning

2) "Shaking off the Dust" is the symbol of leaving something which we do not want to carry. Accordingly we can analyze the meaning of this phrase in this way

When a Peron is involved in preaching the Gospel in a particular place, many things will happen. Some of them will be good and others will not be so good

Thing that are not so good, may be following

-Rejection: Sometimes the follower of Jesus is not accepted in a particular place

 -Some times lots of unwanted Criticism will have to face

-Some times people will spoil the names of the follower when they are challenged by the Gospel values

-Sometimes lots of mental torture will be there

-Sometimes false allegations will destroy the peace of mind of the followers of Jesus

-Some times a Small mistake of the follower of Jesus will spoil his entire good image

-criticisms, hurt feelings, challenges, bad experiences, crisis in life, failures, persecutions, negative talk, betrayals, so on can be considered as a kind of dust take blurs our image.

-In such situation Jesus says, shake off this dust from your image and you carry a clean image so it will be good for the followers and also to the others

Will I be able to shake off this dust from my life? It is a big challenge. As long as this dust covers our image it is we who unnecessarily suffer   

3) Like not so good things there are also many good things will happen in our lives as we start proclaiming the Good News

-Our success in a particular place

-our achievements in a particular situation

-Our love towards particular mission in a particular place

-our attachment to particular place, type of people, culture and a particular type of work

-At times the above things also may become like the dust which once again makes our life difficult

-Sometimes we may glory all the times about the past glory and may forget to work in new situation

Sometimes we may find difficult to move from a particular place and it becomes a big challenge to many

-Unless we shake off the above dust we may not be able to function very well in a new situation

-Need to shake off this dust and need to go with pure  mind and heart to achieve new things in a new situation

3) “At the most what we can do is Shake off the Dust” Nothing more and nothing less

-At times when we are hurt, there is a possibility of taking revenge by dividing the community, teaching a lesson to the person who has hurt us, spoiling the name of the person who challenged us etc

-A follower of jesus is not suppose to do these things. These are against the Gospel Values

-In this situation at the most what we can do is that “we can shake off the dust”. This is the only reactions which we can show. This is what is permitted.

We can do only what is allowed by Jesus and not the above things

-If he is not accepted by people, the maximum what he can do is that shake of the dust. Nothing more. No fighting, no taking revenge, no cursing, nothing. This we need to remember always.

4) Shaking off dust also a sign that the disciple is not affected in any way. Whatever so called rejection or painful things are left there itself. Nothing is carried from there. Leave all the bad things there itself and move forward with fresh thinking.

5) Now the Question is are we ready to Shake of the dust from our feet, from our mind, from our heart, from our eyes, from our personality and finally from our mission

As long as we carry this dust, we suffer terribly and we add extra luggage to our image and our life becomes a burden to us and to the other

So Am I ready to Shake off the dust?

God Bless you and your Family. Praying for you and your dear ones

Fr Maxim D’Souza

Jeppu Seminary

Mangalore