Lectio Divina for Thursday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Theme: “Without cost”
1. Lectio
“Without cost you have received; without cost you are to give.”
(Matthew 10:8)
Jesus sends the Twelve out with empty hands.
They are to carry neither money nor excess provisions because the Gospel is not merchandise. They have freely received the Kingdom, healing, mercy, forgiveness, and friendship with Christ. Therefore, they are to proclaim and share these gifts just as freely.
This passage quietly asks me a difficult question:
Do I see my gifts as possessions to protect, or as gifts to be given away?
It also makes me wonder whether this is not precisely my own invitation to carry these daily Lectio Divinas onto YouTube—not to build an audience for myself, but to offer freely what I have freely received.
2. Meditatio
The thought of beginning a YouTube channel is both exciting and unsettling.
Part of me wonders whether anyone would watch.
Another part secretly hopes many people would.
There lies the temptation.
Jesus never tells the apostles to go build an audience.
He tells them to proclaim the Kingdom.
There is a profound difference.
The audience belongs to me.
The proclamation belongs to Christ.
The more I reflect upon the Church’s Social Doctrine, the more I recognize that it has never been the product of clever marketing or carefully crafted branding. It has grown through centuries because each generation freely received the Gospel and then freely handed it on in response to the “new things” of its own age.
The Church never abandoned her inheritance.
She simply kept proclaiming it in new languages.
Today YouTube happens to be one of those languages.
As Pope Francis reminds us, the Judeo-Christian vision neither worships nature nor exploits it. Instead, it entrusts creation to humanity as a sacred responsibility. A fragile world requires intelligent stewardship that directs, develops, and even limits human power.
That realization has become the heart of my retirement.
I no longer dream simply of raising sheep.
I dream of helping ordinary parishes and neighborhoods see their lawns differently.
Grass clippings become silage.
Waste becomes food.
Urban landscapes become places of regeneration rather than consumption.
Ecology becomes evangelization.
Yet none of this is mine.
Every insight I have received—from Scripture, from the saints, from Laudato Si’, from the witness of Pope Leo and Pope Francis, from decades spent at The Glenn—has been given to me without cost.
How strange it would be to hide those gifts simply because I fear criticism.
The Gospel has always been handed on by ordinary people who decided that fear would not have the final word.
If YouTube becomes simply another place where I proclaim Christ through the language of regenerative agriculture, then perhaps it is not really a new ministry at all.
Perhaps it is merely another road on which Jesus sends His disciples.
3. Oratio
Lord Jesus,
Everything I have that is worth giving has first been given to me.
The faith I profess…
The Church I love…
The land I steward…
The people who have taught me…
Even the breath with which I speak…
—all are gifts.
Keep me from confusing popularity with proclamation.
If You call me to speak through YouTube, let me never measure success by subscribers, views, or applause.
Instead, let me measure success by fidelity.
Today I remember Saint Augustine Zhao Rong and his companions, who proclaimed Your Gospel in China at the cost of their freedom and, ultimately, their lives. They did not calculate the price of discipleship because they had already received everything in You.
Compared to their witness, my fear of embarrassment seems very small indeed.
Grant me a fraction of their courage.
May I proclaim Your Kingdom with joy, humility, and generosity, remembering always that what I have received without cost must also be given without cost.
Amen.
4. Contemplatio (Chestertonian Synthesis)
There is something delightfully absurd about Christianity. The world says that if something is valuable, one should charge dearly for it. Christ says that the most valuable thing in existence—eternal life—is offered freely.
The merchant counts profits.
The missionary counts blessings.
The influencer asks, “How many followers have I gained?”
The apostle asks, “Have I followed Him?”
One may accumulate an audience without ever proclaiming the Gospel. Another may proclaim the Gospel faithfully while speaking to only a handful. Heaven has never confused the two.
Saint Augustine Zhao Rong did not become a martyr because he found an effective communication strategy. He became a martyr because he discovered that Christ Himself was worth more than life.
Perhaps YouTube is nothing more than another dusty road through Galilee.
If so, then Christ is still sending disciples down roads they have never traveled before.
The only requirement is the same as it was two thousand years ago:
Receive freely. Give freely. Trust completely.