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Message of the Day
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Some people want to see God with their eyes as they see a cow, and to love Him as they love their cow - for the milk and cheese and profit it brings them. This is how it is with people who love God for the sake of outward wealth or inward comfort. They do not rightly love God, when they love Him for their own advantage. Indeed, I tell you the truth, any object you have in your mind, however good, will be a barrier between you and the inmost
Truth.
- Meister Eckhart
(How does this quote speak to your image of God? What might be a barrier between you and God at this time in your life?)
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Readings of the Day
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1 COR 3:1-9; PS 33:12-13, 14-15, 20-21 LK 4:38-44 After Jesus left the synagogue, he entered the house of Simon.
Simon’s mother-in-law was afflicted with a severe fever,
and they interceded with him about her.
He stood over her, rebuked the fever, and it left her.
She got up immediately and
waited on them. At sunset, all who had people sick with various diseases
brought them to him.
He laid his hands on each of them and cured them.
And demons also came out from many, shouting, “You are the Son of God.”
But he rebuked them and did not allow them to speak
because they knew that he was the Christ. At daybreak, Jesus left and went to a deserted place.
The crowds went looking for him, and when they came to him,
they tried to prevent him from leaving them.
But he said to them, “To the other towns also
I must
proclaim the good news of the Kingdom of God,
because for this purpose I have been sent.”
And he was preaching in the synagogues of
Judea. USCCB lectionary
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Reflection on the Scripture
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“They tried to keep Him from leaving them.” ¬—Luke 4:42 The crowds tried to prevent Jesus from leaving them. The crowds were unknowingly acting in
opposition to the Father’s will, for the Father sent Jesus to announce the Gospel to the towns of Judea (Lk 4:43). It is certainly a good thing that the crowds wanted Jesus to remain in their midst. But apparently they wanted Jesus to remain to meet their desires for healing rather than to do His Father’s will. At another point in His public ministry, a crowd of Samaritans in the town of Shechem likewise “begged [Jesus] to stay with them
awhile” (Jn 4:40). On this occasion, Jesus did remain and “stayed there two days” (Jn 4:40). The Samaritans came to faith in Jesus as “Savior of the world” through hearing His words for themselves (Jn 4:41-42). Like Mary of Bethany, the Samaritans apparently wanted only to listen to Jesus’ words (Lk 10:41-42). Now that Jesus has risen, it is indeed better for us that He has ascended (Jn 16:7). For now He does constantly remain with us.
Jesus is not hard to find. He is in the Eucharist, in the Tabernacle, in the Holy Spirit, in His Word, in His people, in the Sacraments. He is not hiding from us; rather, He is hiding for us. At times, we try to prevent Jesus from leaving; at other times, we aren’t interested in staying with Him when He wants us to remain by His side. Why do we want Jesus in our life? Do we want Jesus in our life for the same reason Jesus wants to be in our
life? Do we want Him to remain with us the same way He wants to remain with us? Our answer will reveal the depth of our relationship with Jesus. Prayer: Father, give me an insatiable hunger for Jesus. Promise: “Happy the nation whose God is the Lord.” —Ps 33:12 Presentation Ministries
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Spiritual Reading
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Readings from Jesus Alive in Our Lives, by Philip St. Romain. Ave Maria Press, 1985. Contemplative Ministries, Inc. 2011. Part Three, Gift of the Spirit Chapter : The Holy Spirit and the
Trinity - Selected quotes
It’s only natural that our inquiry lead us to not only investigate what the Holy Spirit does, but who the Spirit is. Our religious education has taught us the answer to this, of course: the Spirit is God—more specifically, the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity. So goes the teaching, but in order to
appreciate more this profession, let’s take a little time to reflect on how we got from Jesus’ teaching about a Helper to such a formal dogma and a radically new vision of God.
First, we can look to Jesus’ own words about himself and the Spirit, especially in John’s Gospel, where we noted statements such as the following: “He who comes from above is
above all others. . .” (Jn. 3:31)
Jesus’ constantly calling God his Father, suggesting that he is God’s son, and not in a creaturely sense (E.g., Jn. 3:16).
“To have seen me is to have seen the Father.” (Jn. 14:9) Even if one questions whether such words were, in fact, spoken by Jesus, John’s placing them
on his lips leaves little doubt that the early Church viewed Jesus as an incarnation of the divine. Their reflection on the meaning of Jesus’ miracles and his resurrection had led them to this conclusion, and yet it is understood that Jesus is distinct from the Father (”The Father is greater than I”) nor is he simply a human being who became so filled with God as to manifest the Creator with a perfection unsurpassed before or since (the Arian heresy). Expressing an Apostolic
conviction in the first century of Christianity, John writes that Jesus is “the Word made flesh” (Jn. 1:14). That “Word,” who was “with God in the beginning” and “through whom all things came to be” was fully divine: “and the Word was God” (1:1-3).
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