Your Royalty as God's Child

Yesterday we celebrated the feast of Christ, our King.  This morning in prayer I imagined the following conversation with the Lord. It went like this:

 

                I am King.

                You are a King’s daughter.

                You are royalty!

                You are the recipient of my inheritance,

eternal  life in my Kingdom.

                I secured that inheritance for you

 by my obedience as Son of Man to My Father’s will

—your salvation and the salvation of the whole world.

When I was nailed to a cross,

 when I crushed the head of Satan,

all nations, all kingdoms of the earth, all languages (cf. Daniel 7: 13-14)

were brought under My rule and reconciled to My Father.

As Daniel prophesied, “all peoples, all nations and languages

serve [God].

[ M]y dominion is an everlasting dominion

that shall not be taken away.”

(M]y kingdom shall not be destroyed” (Daniel 7: 13-14)

 

Look, Lord, at the world!

 

The world as you know it is passing away!

God shall reign forever.

God reigns now and has reigned before this world ever came into existence and will reign eternally.

God's Gives Us the Work We Need to do Each Day

The statement in today’s first reading, Phil. 2: 12-18, that touched me is “…God is the one who, for his good purpose, works in you both to desire and to work” and the phrase in the responsorial Psalm, Ps. 27, which reads:   may I “gaze on the loveliness of the Lord…”  This evening, as I reflected upon the challenges of today, I realize deeply that it is God who put the desire in me to do the work of this day and also presented today’s work.  This leaves me feeling humbled, as I frequently wonder what the day’s work might be, as vocation ministry is not like going to a classroom every day or going to a counseling center to work with clients every day.  No, it is not that structured nor am I guaranteed that anyone will inquiry about religious life or be knocking at the door to become a Sister of the Sorrowful Mother.   Yet every day, God puts within me the desire to work in His vineyard and presents the day’s work to me as the day unfolds.

 

The second statement “may I gaze upon the loveliness of the Lord” touched me as I was beginning to complain about issues to myself.  “Wait a minute,” I said to myself. “What about seeking the loveliness of the Lord today instead of focusing on some negatives. What a difference the day might make”, I said to myself. And how true for me today. It truly unfolded with many surprises within it—gifts from the Lord, including the discipline to take on a challenging task!

 

May the Word of God continue to shape my life and yours.

Being Co-heirs of Jesus' Promises

As I reflect on today’s first reading, Eph. 3: 2-12, I am awed.  Paul reminds us that we Gentiles are “co-heirs, members of the same Body, and co-partners” in Christ’s promises given in the Gospel. What does Christ promise us in the Gospel? The first thought that comes to me is his promise to Dismis on the cross when He says to him: “This day you will be with me in paradise” ((Lk 23:43).  The second thought that surfaces for me is Jesus’ prayer “Consecrate them in the truth” (Jn 17:17), that they may all “be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me” (Jn 17:21).  The  third thought that sprung up in me is Jesus’ statement  in John 14:12  that those who believe in Him will do the works that He does  and will do greater things than these because Jesus is returning to the Father.

Wow! What promises! And each of us who believe in Jesus will realize these promises in our lives!

Faith in Jesus' authority

Today’s Gospel, Mt. 8: 5-17, reiterates the story of the centurion’s request of Jesus: “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully.”  Jesus immediately responds: “I will come and cure him.”  Imagine telling Jesus that someone you love dearly is sick and/or in serious trouble.  Jesus, without hesitation, says to you: “I will come and cure him/her. I will go and help.”  You and I do not need to imagine that. Our God is that way!  We may not see the results instantaneously but our faith tells us that God responded.  The point, I think, is the asking and that we bring our concerns to Jesus, knowing who Jesus is!

In the story just told, the centurion says to Jesus: No, you do not need to come to my house.  “I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof; only say the word and my servant will be healed…” And then he says: “You know, Lord, I, too, am a person under authority and I also have authority. I say to a servant ‘Come’ and he comes. ‘Do this’ and he does it.”  It’s like he is saying to Jesus: “Lord, you are author of heaven and earth. You have dominion over everything: health and sickness, light and darkness, evil and good. Just command the evil to leave my servant and it will be gone.”  What faith!  What about yours and mine?

the gift of meditation, the gift of faith

The Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother, according to their Rule or Constitution, set aside a minimum of 30 minutes each day for meditation upon the Scriptures or another source of spiritual nourishment. This morning I meditated on the first reading of today’s liturgy (Col.2:6-15). What an awesome reading in which we are reminded that we share in the fullness of the diety in human form in Christ Jesus.  We share in the fullness; we do not, obviously, possess the fullness. But even to share in the fullness of the diety is awesome.  How is it that we are given this gift? St. Paul  tells us that, on the cross, Jesus took our transgressions upon Himself, obliterated them,  removed them, nailed them to the cross.  All that causes death was nailed to the Cross with Christ and all that causes new life in God was raised to life with Jesus. In baptism, we, too, die and rise with Christ. The self that was alienated from God and the things of God by sin and selfishness, greed and lust for power, prestige and worldly pleasures—the allurements of the world, worldly philosophies and ideologies—was buried with Christ at our baptisms.  We rose with Christ through the same power that raised Jesus from the dead. The self that rose with Christ is a new self. We put on Jesus Christ in baptism.  We are now rooted in Christ Jesus.  Our hearts have been circumcised , that is, we underwent a spiritual circumcision, not a physical one.  Our hearts, not a physical part of our bodies, were changed by baptism into Christ.  By dying and rising with Christ in our baptisms and through the faith that was given to us in baptism,  we are now spiritually dead to sin, selfishness, worldly philosophies and ideologies, jealousies, lusts for power, prestige and popularity, fear of death (saving the self, not losing it in love, in truth, in purity). We rose with Christ transformed into new persons, reconciled to God and to one another. What a grace!