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If your life consistently bears no fruit, God will intervene to discipline you. If your life bears some fruit, God will intervene to prune you. If your life bears a lot of fruit, God will invite you to abide more deeply with Him.
- Bruce Wilkinson
(It might even be that all three are going on. How do you experience God disciplining, pruning and inviting you to abide more deeply?)
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RU 1:1, 3-6, 14B-16, 22; PS 146:5-6AB, 6C-7, 8-9A, 9BC-10
MT 22:34-40
When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,
they gathered together, and one of them,
a scholar of the law, tested him by asking,
"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?"
He said to him,
"You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart,
with all your soul, and with all your mind.
This is the greatest and the first commandment.
The second is like it:
You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments."
USCCB lectionary
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Reflection on the Scripture |
"Both Mahlon and Chilion died also, and the woman was left with neither her two sons nor her husband." —Ruth 1:5
All the men in Naomi's family died, her husband and two married sons. Under these circumstances, many would despair and their lives would fall apart. But, by God's power, death in the family can become life-giving and lift the family to new heights of love and grace.
For example, Ruth could rise above her grief at her husband's death to exhibit a faithfulness to her mother-in-law, a prophetic example of our heavenly Father's faithfulness. When Ruth left her homeland with her mother-in-law, she committed social suicide. According to the customs of the time, she threw away her future and condemned herself to abject poverty. However, by a miraculous turn of events, Ruth
married Boaz and became the great-grandmother of King David (Ru 4:17).
A mourning and bereft family was used mightily in God's salvation plan. A widow traumatized by the deaths of husband, father-in-law, and brother-in-law gave life and prepared the way for Jesus the Messiah. God turns all things, even death, to the good for those who love Him (Rm 8:28).
Prayer: Father, thank You for Brother Death through which life enters the world. Console and heal the grieving. We trust You.
Promise: " 'You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, with your whole soul, and with all your mind.' This is the greatest and first commandment." —Mt 22:37-38
Presentation Ministries
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Abandonment to Divine Providence
- by Jean-Pierre de Caussade
BOOK II,
CHAPTER I. ON THE NATURE AND EXCELLENCE OF THE STATE OF ABANDONMENT
SECTION II. The Most Perfect Way
Every state of body or soul, and whatever happens interiorly or exteriorly as revealed at each moment to these souls is, to them, the fulness of the divine action, and the fulness of their joy. Created things are, to them, nothing but misery and dearth; the only true and just measure is in the working of the divine action. Thus, if it take away thoughts, words, books, food, persons, health, even life itself, it
is exactly the same as if it did the contrary. The soul loves the divine action and finds it equally sanctifying under whatever shape it presents itself. It does not reason about the way it acts; it suffices for its approval that whatever comes is from this source.
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