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We can walk without fear, full of hope and courage and strength to do His will, waiting for the endless good which He is always giving as fast
as He can get us able to take it in.
- George Macdonald
(What part of this message speaks to you today?)
Monthly forum on Christianity and Spirituality
September 7, 2023: God-Talk for the Picnic: A New Look at the Trinity, by Sr. Carla Mae Streeter, OP. 7:30 - 8:30 Central
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1 Thes 5:1-6, 9-11; Ps 27:1, 4, 13-14 Lk 4:31-37 Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town of Galilee.
He taught them on the sabbath,
and they were astonished at his teaching
because he spoke with authority.
In the synagogue there was a man with the spirit of an unclean demon,
and he cried out in a loud voice,
"What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?
Have you come to destroy us?
I know who you are–the Holy One of God!"
Jesus rebuked him and said, "Be quiet! Come out of him!"
Then the demon threw the man down in front of them
and came out of him without doing him any harm.
They were all amazed and said to one another,
"What is there about his word?
For with authority and power he commands the unclean spirits,
and they come out."
And news of him spread everywhere in the surrounding
region.
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Reflection on the Scriptures
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When you listen to the word of God in Scripture how do you respond to it? Do you hear it with indifference, selective submission, or with the full assent of faith and obedience? When Jesus taught he spoke with authority. He spoke the word of God as no one had spoken it before. When the Rabbis taught they supported their statements with quotes from other authorities. The prophets spoke
with delegated authority - Thus says the Lord. When Jesus spoke he needed no authorities to back his statements. He was authority incarnate - the Word of God made flesh. When he spoke, God spoke. When he commanded even the demons obeyed.
God's Word is alive and active
Cyril of Alexandria (376-444 AD), in his commentary on
this passage from the Gospel of Luke, tells us that Jesus had all power and authority to heal every sickness and expel every demonic power because he was the living and active Word of God the Father (John 1:14 and Hebrews 4:12):
The bystanders, witnesses of such great deeds, were astonished at the power of his word. He performed his miracles, without offering up a prayer, asking no one else at all for the
power to accomplish them. Since he is the living and active Word of God the Father, by whom all things exist, and in whom all things are, in his own person he crushed Satan and closed the profane mouth of impure demons. [Commentary on Luke, Homily 12].
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The Ascent of Mount Carmel, by St. John of the Cross E. Allison Peers Translation. Paperback, Kindle, Audio Book.
Click here to purchase on Amazon.com BOOK THE THIRD Which treats of the
purgation of the active night of the memory and will. Gives instruction how the soul is to behave with respect to the apprehensions of these two faculties, that it may come to union with God, according to the two faculties aforementioned, in perfect hope and charity.
Chapter 5 Of the third evil which comes to the soul by way of the distinct natural knowledge or the
memory. 2. This we are constantly learning by experience; for we observe that, whenever the soul begins to think of any matter, it is moved and disturbed, either much or little, with respect to that thing, according to the nature of its apprehension. If it be a troublesome and grievous matter, the soul finds sadness in it; if pleasant, desire and joy, and so forth. Wherefore the result of the
changing of that apprehension is necessarily disturbance; and thus the soul is now joyful, now sad; now it hates, now loves; and it cannot continue in one and the same attitude (which is an effect of moral tranquillity save when it strives to forget all things. It is clear, then, that knowledge greatly hinders the good of the moral virtues in the soul.
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