Good morning good people,
It is 03rd March 2022.
We reflect on Deuteronomy 30:15-20 and Luke 9:22-25
It is by giving up something, we gain something greater. To choose life and blessing, consciously we need to listen and love.
Through Moses, God sets the choice before us as God did it with the people of Israel.
It is not a matter of choice between obedience and love. The book of Deuteronomy stresses that we have no choice in obeying stress more on the importance of and the consequences of love. Without listening or obeying we cannot love God. Loving is the only proof of obedience. People who are in love do not have an issue of obedience. God is interested in offering us something that is lasting. Love alone last and withstands to the end. As people of Israel bonded together in love during the experience in the desert, we are invited to be during the time of Lent.
Change is inevitable to be fruitful. What change are we making during this time of Lent? “For what does it profit them if they gain the whole world and lose or forfeit themselves? This verse changed St. Francis Xavier. As we are in the time of preparation for Easter, we are offered the first prophecy of the Passion. Just like the disciples, we hate to hear and misunderstood the mystery of sacrifice, suffering and pain. It is time to ruminate about the suffering Messiah. We all love to celebrate the Easter and so we need to share in His suffering too.
Is there a connection between listening and losing? We lose life and blessing when we have chosen to be deaf and numb.
Indeed, we gradually but surely lose ourselves by sinning. Sin has a wider impact beyond us.
The courage to participate in the sufferings of Christ is the medicine for the wounds of sin.
Lent is not the time to be scrupulous, senseless, and sinful. But it is indeed the time to re-bonding with God and be loyal to God. Most of us prefer choosing fleeting happiness over life, knowledge over God.
Living is painful and surrounded by sufferings at times, yet it is better to live than to die.
To be a disciple of Christ means to have the openness and willingness to embrace the Cross of Christ. The way of the cross is the answer to the sufferings of humanity.
Let us keep on choosing life, and blessings throughout Lent. May the Lord bless us to get our self-denial right.