GOD'S COMING IS CERTAIN

Saturday, third week of Lent/2024
Reflection from Friar Nicholas Okeke,OP

Theme: God’s coming is as Certain as Dawn

God heals a soul through various means; the path of healing usually goes through pain and misery. It is a common practice among orthopaedic doctors to sometimes break up a malformed part of a limb to help it form and heal properly. To make us walk straight and upright in his path, God sometimes breaks up our malformed spiritual limbs and guides them to proper healing and functioning. This is the understanding we get from the passage of Hosea in the first reading. “He has torn us to pieces, but he will heal us; he has struck us down, but he will bandage our wounds; after a day or two he will raise us back to life, on the third day he will raise us and we shall live in his presence.” The three days of the spiritual repair work refer to the fact that the pattern of our suffering is the passion and death of Jesus Christ.  We read yesterday from Hosea that the ways of Yahweh are straight paths, the righteous walk safely on them, but sinners stumble on them. We injure and wound our limbs when we attempt to walk on the spiritual path with inordinate desires. These desires make us walk in the dark and stumble on the way to perfection. Hence, God’s infinite love comes to our aid by permitting and directing pains and sufferings as proper means to purify our desires. Thus, the coming of the Lord to us is through these various means; first, he will come to purify us of evil inclinations and clinging sins; second, he will come to illumine our mind with true knowledge of his word; and third, he will come to take us to himself as a father would a lost and found son, that we may live in his presence always. 

The divine work of repair and restoration of a malfunctioning soul is effective only to the extent he is willing to cooperate with God. A good foundation for the desired cooperation is the Lenten mindset we have initiated with the Lenten mantra prayer: ‘I am dust and unto dust I will return.’ This foundation is solid for the cooperation we need for God to restore us to Himself. If we have not internalized this mindset, it means that we are yet unfamiliar with our maladies, and still walking in the dark. This is the truth our Lord revealed to the scribes and Pharisees who considered themselves righteous and not in need of God’s healing. He used a parable to drive this important lesson home to them. According to the Lord, the Pharisee said his prayer to himself. “I thank you, God, that I am not grasping, unjust, adulterous like the rest of mankind, and particularly that I am not like this tax collector here. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes on all I get.” He prayed to himself because he was self-exulting. But the tax collector prayed to God by the condition of his humility: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” Our Lord concluded: “This man, I tell you, went home again at rights with God; and the other did not.” The Spirit has taught us how to garner the benefits of this season of Lent, let us humble ourselves so that God can work in us to make us his dwelling place.

Let us pray: Grant us, Lord, the grace to internalize our nothingness to be open to your redeeming work in us.       

 

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

BECOMING A DEPENDABLE FRIEND

Image
FRIDAY, SEVENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Eccl 6:5-17; Ps 119:12,16,18,27,34-35; Mk 10:1-12 Making and being a Good Friend The usefulness of a faithful friend is the subject discussed in the passage of Sirach we are considering. From the qualities that make a good friend, we understand that faithfulness depends on the perfection we attain in the formative school of wisdom. The first lesson we learn in nature is faithfulness. The quality of faithfulness is so closely aligned with nature that we consider nature and faithfulness synonyms. The faithfulness of nature, and subsequently of wisdom, is hinted at when we read that wisdom stands at her post/gate daily to beckon the passers-by to turn in and partake of her table. Everything that God made participates in this faithfulness of wisdom in the sense that each remains faithful to his will without failing or leading our minds astray. First, Sirach admonishes us on friendliness to people in general: “A kindly turn of speech multiplies a ...
Read more

UNDERSTANDING OUR AFFLICTIONS

Image
ST. JEROME, PRIEST, DOCTOR Job 1:6-22; Ps 17:1-3,6-7; Lk 9:46-50 Salvation of the Just from the affliction of evil We have the beginning of Job in the first reading today. The reading has many hidden lessons we can learn to foster our relationship with God. The first that seems very obvious is the fact of Satan attending to God with the sons of God. By this, we must understand that every rational creature of God is among his sons. They all attend to God, from whom they receive life and sustenance. God sustains all his creatures in being, both material and immaterial creatures. They also ask God for permission to carry out a course of action. Nothing moves in the heavens and on earth without God knowing and permitting it. The attending of rational creatures is what we call prayer. The good and bad angels pray to God for permission to carry out actions or bring about ends that agree with his divine will. God usually hears or permits these prayers based on his divine justice in acco...
Read more

The offsprings of the Old man and the New Man

Image
Monday, fifth week of lent/2024 Reflection from Friar Nicholas Okeke, OP Offsprings of Old man and New Man To be able to live the new life within the new Covenant in Jesus Christ, the old life must come to an end. The distinctive difference between the old man and the new man is the focus of desires. The old man and all who live by him have their desires focussed on the satisfaction of self. On the other hand, the new man and those living by him desires only to fulfil God's holy will. Thus, the old man and his offspring obey the law of sin and death. Living for self alone breeds sins, and sin causes death. So, the old man and all living by him are dead and harbingers of death to others. They are adept at manipulating the Law of God to perpetuate their interest and selfish desires. An example of this skill is the treatment the two old judges of Israel in Babylon meted out to Susanna, wife of Joachim, employing the Law of Moses as given in the first reading. “Two elderly men had ...
Read more