Message of 9-7-12
Published: Fri, 09/07/12
A Daily Spiritual Seed
- resources for prayer and spiritual growth
Message of the Day
I share everything with Christ,
spirit and body, nails and resurrection.
Christ . . . thou are for me my native land,
my strength, my glory, everything.
Christ is my strength and my breath
and the wonderful prize for my running.
It is he who enables me to run well.
- Gregory Nazianzen, Theological Poems -
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Lectionary Readings of the Day
http://www.usccb.org/calendar/index.cfm?showLit=1&action=month
1 Cor 4:1-5; Ps 37:3-4, 5-6, 27-28, 39-40; Lk 5:33-39
R. (39a) The salvation of the just comes from the Lord.
Trust in the LORD and do good,
that you may dwell in the land and be fed in security.
Take delight in the LORD,
and he will grant you your heart's requests.
Commit to the LORD your way;
trust in him, and he will act.
He will make justice dawn for you like the light;
bright as the noonday shall be your vindication.
Turn from evil and do good,
that you may abide forever;
For the LORD loves what is right,
and forsakes not his faithful ones.
Criminals are destroyed
and the posterity of the wicked is cut off.
The salvation of the just is from the LORD;
he is their refuge in time of distress.
And the LORD helps them and delivers them;
he delivers them from the wicked and saves them,
because they take refuge in him.
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Reflection on the Scriptures
- http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/daily.html
When we trust in God, we believe that God will provide us with the comfort we seek from living with the realization of our eventual physical death. We can believe that there is eternal life after this physical one, because God has shown us in a variety of ways that God can be trusted, and that God has revealed to us that this eternal life exists. When our trust in God is shaken, for example by the unexpected or violent deaths of loved ones, or tragedies that befall communities, or evil acts by others, we question God - "If there is a God, how could God let this happen?" But it is not that God doesn't exist, only that our trust has been weakened. How can our trust be weakened? Well, we are human, and the only existence we really know from all our senses is this one. So if that existence is threatened it is easy for us to lose trust. . .
We can't control God, but we can control ourselves. We build trust-worthiness by being aware of our actions of stewardship toward what we have received. We can choose to do good; we can choose to turn from evil; we can be faithful. We will fail because we are human, but we also will succeed because we can choose to re-form ourselves, and because God will give us the strength to change our lives. And as we do, we demonstrate to God that we are good stewards, and thus trustworthy.
- by Tom Purcell
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Spiritual Reading
On Cleaving to God
by St. Albert the Great
Furthermore nothing is sharper than love, nothing is more subtle, nothing more penetrating. It will not rest until it has by its very nature penetrated the whole power, the depth and the totality of the loved one. It wants to make itself one with the beloved, and itself, if it were possible, to be what the beloved is too. Thus it cannot bear that anything should stand between itself and the beloved object, which is God, but presses eagerly towards him. As a result it
never rests until it has left everything else behind and come to him alone.
- Chapter 12. How powerful the love of God is.
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