Message of 2-24-11

Published: Fri, 02/24/12


A Daily Spiritual Seed
- resources for prayer and spiritual growth


Message of the Day

Prayer is not a way of making use of God; prayer is a way of offering ourselves to God in order that He should be able to make use of us. It may be that one of our great faults in prayer is that we talk too much and listen too little. When prayer is at its highest we wait in silence for God's voice to us; we linger in His presence for His peace and His power to flow over us and around us; we lean back in His everlasting arms and feel the serenity of perfect security in Him.
  - William Barclay (1907-1978), The Plain Man's Book of Prayers

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Lectionary Readings of the Day
   http://www.usccb.org/calendar/index.cfm?showLit=1&action=month

Is 58:1-9a;    Ps 51:3-4, 5-6ab, 18-19;    Mt 9:14-15

R. (19b) A heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.

Have mercy on me, O God, in your goodness;
in the greatness of your compassion wipe out my offense.
Thoroughly wash me from my guilt
and of my sin cleanse me.

For I acknowledge my offense,
and my sin is before me always:
"Against you only have I sinned,
and done what is evil in your sight."

For you are not pleased with sacrifices;
should I offer a burnt offering, you would not accept it.
My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit;
a heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.

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Reflection on the Scripture
   http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/daily.html

In the reading, God chastises his people for making such a display of their fasting while at the same time mistreating their employees and fighting amongst themselves.  He wants them to make their fast a time to forgive others, feed the hungry, and care for those who are hurting.  Surely, this is what God wants us to focus on rather than just the rules of Lent. This is a time for us to renew our commitment to finding God in others by providing food for the homeless, speaking out against capital punishment, donating our time and love to a child in need. It is also closer to home that God calls us to find him, in those we live and work with such as the boss who we think is unjust, the family member who seems to annoy us on purpose, the lonely neighbor, etc.  A little further in the chapter God tells Isaiah if we do these things:

"Then your light shall rise in the darkness, and your gloom shall become like midday. Then the Lord will guide you always and satisfy your thirst in parched places, will give strength to your bones, and you shall be like a watered garden, like a flowing spring whose waters never fail."

We can never outdo our God in love and generosity.

- by Susan Tinley

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Spiritual Reading

On Cleaving to God
     by St. Albert the Great

So if the will is good and is obedient and united to God with pure understanding, one is not hurt even if the flesh and the senses and the outer person is moved to evil, and is slow to good, or even if the inner person is slow to feel devotion, but should simply cleave to God with faith and good will in naked understanding. He is doing this if he is conscious of all his own imperfection and nothingness, recognises his good to consist in his Creator alone, abandons himself with all his faculties and powers, and all creatures, and immerses himself wholly and completely in the Creator, so that he directs all his actions purely and entirely in his Lord God, and seeks nothing apart from him, in whom he recognises all good and all joy of perfection to be found. And he is so transformed in a certain sense into God that he cannot think, understand, love or remember anything but God himself and the things of God. Other creatures however and even himself he does not see, except in God, nor does he love anything except God alone, nor remember anything about them or himself except in God.     

- Chapter 6. That the devout person should cleave to God with naked understanding and will.

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