Shark Tank is a very popular television program. During each episode, aspiring entrepreneurs enter the “tank” to stand before a panel of famous, financially successful investors referred to as “sharks”.
The entrepreneurs tell the sharks about a product or service they have developed. They then offer the sharks an opportunity to invest a certain amount of money for a share in the company they formed to market that product or service.
The sharks evaluate the potential of each entrepreneur’s company to become a financial success. They then decide to accept, modify, or reject the proposed offer.
Entrepreneurs who succeed in getting one or more of the sharks to invest receive financial backing and validation of the product or service they have created.
Those budding capitalists also gain something else: they receive affirmation from highly successful people that they merit an investment.
This Sunday’s readings are about people whom God finds deserving of an investment.
In our First Reading (2 Chronicles 36:14-16, 19-23), we hear about the Chosen People who had turned away from God. Their sinfulness had led to the destruction of Jerusalem and their being sent into exile in Babylon. But in his mercy, God did not abandon them. Instead, God continued to invest in them, he continued to show them love and mercy. God prompted King Cyrus to allow the Jewish people to return home and to rebuild the Temple.
Then in our Gospel (John 3:14-21), we hear of the greatest investment that God ever made in the people he created.
As Saint John tells us, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.”
God’s love led him to invest his Son in us so that we might be saved from sin and brought into a new and everlasting relationship with him.
Then in our Second Reading (Ephesians 2:4-10), Saint Paul emphasizes the action of God on our behalf. Paul tells us that we are freed from the hold of sin not through our efforts but because of what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. As Paul says, “by grace you have been saved …. and this is not from you, it is the gift of God.”
Obviously, God sees our potential to become good and holy people. If he did not, why would God have invested his mercy, his love, and his Son in us?
As we know from watching Shark Tank, investors only put their resources where they see a good opportunity for success.
© 2024 Rev. Thomas Iwanowski