Jeremiah said: “I hear the whisperings of many: ‘Terror on every side! Denounce! let us denounce him!’ All those who were my friends are on the watch for any misstep of mine. ‘Perhaps he can be tricked; then we will prevail, and take our vengeance on him.’ But the Lord is with me, like a mighty champion: my persecutors will stumble, they will not triumph. In their failure they will be put to utter shame, to lasting, unforgettable confusion. O Lord of hosts, you who test the just, who probe mind and heart let me witness the vengeance you take on them for to you I have entrusted my cause. Sing to the Lord, praise the Lord, for he has rescued the life of the poor from the power of the wicked!”

Jesus said to the Twelve: “Fear no one. Nothing is concealed that will not be revealed, nor secret that will not be known. What I say to you in the darkness, speak in the light; what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops. And do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, be afraid of the one who can destroy both soul and body in Gehenna. Are not two sparrows sold for a small coin? Yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father’s knowledge. Even all the hairs of your head are counted. So do not be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows. Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father. 33But whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father.”

Jesus asks his twelve Apostles, amid persecutions and death threats, to declare openly his teachings they have learned in the open and in their private conversations, even if it disturbs others. They should not keep his message private.

In their mission as proclaimers, there is no place for cowardice. Rather they should be afraid of cowardice, for that will send them to hell. In the First Reading, we hear of Jeremiah relating his sufferings as a result of courageously speaking on God’s behalf.

For, indeed, to be God’s prophet is a dangerous enterprise. All that the prophet hears around him is his destruction. As a human being, Jeremiah finds it difficult to endure all these.

In the Second Reading, Paul reflects on how humanity’s sin is the cause of our death. Death started with Adam to Moses. Death started with Adam, and it did not spare Jesus, the one who was to come.

We, Christians, are missionaries by nature. By our lives, we are to give witness to our faith no matter what. If we genuinely believe that God has spoken to us, then we must engage unbelief, resistance, and threats.

We can draw inspiration from Jeremiah, and we can only resonate with him when we, too, do our prophetic roles. We, too, can become truly Christian disciples if we suffer and embrace death like Christ.