1LB18.   Genesis 9:8-15.  God washes away sin by washing away the sinners.  With the saintly survivors God makes a covenant to never again devastate the earth and its mortal beings by another flood.

Psalm 25:4-5, 6-7, 8-9.  “Good and upright is the Lord, thus he shows sinners the way.”  Now he wishes to conquer sin by personally guiding each sinner.  The refrain is: “Your ways, O Lord, are love and truth to those who keep your covenant.”  Through his truth and love God shows the way to heaven to those who wish to be obedient to Him.

Mark 1:12-15.  For forty days Jesus remained in the desert so to call us to remain the desert of Lent to repent of our sins, replacing our sinful ways with the spiritual life that comes to us through the gospel.  The never-ending temptations of the devil serve to force us to become more consciously dependent on the Holy Spirit and less complacent and careless about our spiritual life.  As long as we are alive in this world, i.e. in the flesh, we are, so to speak, “among the wild beasts,” i.e. the powerful allurements of this world.  Everyday our baptismal commitment or covenant to be members of the kingdom of God is challenged.

1 Peter 3:18-22.  By suffering and dying for us on the cross, Jesus enabled us to follow him in his resurrection and ascension to heaven.  The flood prefigured our baptism, our being cleansed of sin, so that we can join Jesus in heaven where he reigns with the Father.  Perhaps the sentence: “In it (death in the flesh) he also went to preach to the spirits in prison” recalls the sentence in the Apostles’ Creed: “he descended into hell.”  I can only guess that St. Peter means to say that Jesus went to those who died before his act of redemption, including those  who died in the flood, to offer them a chance to also be redeemed.

6B21.   Leviticus 13:1-2, 44-46.  Among the Hebrews sickness, especially leprosy was considered to be the result of one’s sinfulness.  The word ‘unclean’ then meant to be unclean in every way.

Mark 1: 40-45.   Our gospel begins, “A leper came to Jesus and kneeling down begged him and said, ‘If you wish, you can make me clean.’” Jesus then said, “I do will it.  Be made clean.”  “And he was made clean.”  Although the leper was physically cured of leprosy, some day he would die from something else.  More than being clean of leprosy, being clean of sinfulness would give him the life that is everlasting health.  In John 6:68c after many of Jesus’ disciples chose to no longer follow Jesus because he told them they must eat his body and drink his blood, Peter, refusing to abandon Jesus said to Jesus, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”  Jesus’ fame and popularity because of his miraculous works were meant to challenge people to believe in him as their eternal Savior, to take them beyond the physical that dies, to the spiritual that never dies.  All too many of the people embraced the miracles that benefited their bodies here and now, but not the life in Jesus that would give them eternal salvation.

1 Corinthians 10:31—11:1.     Paul wrote: “Do everything for the glory of God.”  Paul did that by trying “to please everyone in every way, not seeking my own benefit but that of the many, that they may be saved.”  He wrote in last Sunday’s epistle: “I have become all things to all, to save at least some.”  Paul was always attempting in his person to reflect the Savior.  So he wrote: “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.”  We are also called to show something of Jesus in ourselves through our daily life of faith in Jesus so to bring some to Jesus.  Our lives should be the life of the good news that is Jesus within us.

6B18.   Leviticus 13:1-2, 44-46.  This is one of the commands of the Torah or Law of the Lord for the Hebrew people.  People who had leprosy were considered both physically and morally unclean and sinful.  Any contact with them would make one unclean and so lepers needed to cry out to warn people to stay their distance.

Mark 1:40-45.  I imagine that this leper has heard of how powerful Jesus is and so says to Jesus, “If you wish, you can make me clean.”  “Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand, touched him, and said to him, ‘I do will it. Be made clean.’”  We give glory to God when we, recognizing our needs, humble ourselves before the Lord and request his power to make us clean and whole and holy.  This is something of the daily bread that we petition for in the ‘Our Father prayer’.  What we cannot do, God can do but we need to ask so to receive.  We must live with a never ending sense of having needs we cannot fill and the willingness to ask the only one who can fill those needs.

Jesus commands the cleaned leper not to broadcast the miracle because he would be deluged with miracle seekers.  Instead the leper did not do as he was commanded.  He had gained a healthy body but, by rejected the will of God, he lost the holiness of soul.

1 Corinthians 10:31-11:1.  Paul implores us, “Do everything for the glory of God.”  We will be working for the glory of God if we always seek to please God in all things, to accomplish his will.  Reading the lives of the saints helps us understand how to please the Lord above all things.

5B21.   Job 7:1-4, 6-7.   Filled with a sense of desolation, Job says, “I shall not see happiness again.”  Why does something like this appear in the Bible?  The importance of being empty and in deep need is to have nowhere else to go except to God.  This Sunday’s Psalm 147 says, “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” “The Lord sustains the lowly.”  Our weakness is an invitation and opportunity to live in God’s strength.    Psalm 147 goes on to say: “Great is our Lord and mighty in power.”  If we think that we can do all on our own without God because we read something or have some rules to follow, we are lost.  That was the downfall of the Pharisees.

Mark 1:29-39.  The demons that Jesus drove out knew that he was “the Holy One of God.”  However, they could not and would not accept him into their hearts as the God of their lives because Satan had already taken possession of that position.  To know who Jesus is to have the door open and to intellectually see who he is.  Far more important than to know who Jesus is in our minds is to invite him into our hearts and have him as the love that is our life that makes us the rich soil that bears the fruit that is called holiness.

Jesus went off to pray in a deserted place.  In his humanness he sought to be filled with the divine strength of his Father.   Through prayer God filled Jesus’ humanness, as God does with our humanness, with his divine strength.  Through his miracles and preaching Jesus sought to fill the people with the saving love and life of his Father.  Earthly life dies at the grave as does the life of all the living creatures of this earth.  Eternal life is Jesus’ life within us that knows no grave.  Choose to live the life that never dies!

1 Corinthians 9:16-19, 22-23.   Paul wrote:  “All this I do for the sake of the gospel, so that I too may have a share in it.”  The recompense that Paul seeks is to win the prize (1 Corinthians 9:24) that is eternal life in heaven.  For him it is superfluous to think of anything else.  True life is God and only God is genuine life.  Everything else is an eventual garbage heap.

5B18.   Job 7:1-4, 6-7.  Job says, “I shall not see happiness again.”  He feels hopelessly lost, unable to help himself to find any sense of happiness or self-worth.  It is time for him to turn to God to do what he cannot do on his own.

Psalm 147:1-2, 3-4, 5-6.  God rebuilds and gathers together those who cannot help themselves, “for he is gracious.”  He is all powerful and uses his power to help the powerless.

Mark 1:29-39.  “Simon’s mother-in-law lay sick with a fever” unable to help herself.  Jesus raised her up from her sickness and continued on to help others who were helpless with sickness and demon-possession.  He was able to bring God’s powerful aid to those in need because God worked through him in his humanness.  “Rising very early before dawn, he left and went off to a deserted place, where he prayed.”  Jesus, in his humanness, sets an example for all humanity to go to God to find the help we need and to appeal for help for others.

A river of the needy people came to him.  “They brought to him all who were ill or possessed by demons.  The whole town was gathered at the door.”  They said, “Everyone is looking for you.”  He poured out from himself all the goodness that God had given him to give, not for his own good but for their good.

1 Corinthians 9:16-19, 22-23.  Paul feels obliged to preach the gospel but without expecting or requiring any compensation from those to whom he preaches.  He goes to all possible lengths, he says, “to save at least some.  All this I do for the sake of the gospel, so that I too may have a share in it,” the good news that Jesus has saved us from our sins to give us eternal life.  Jesus said in John 14:23: “Whoever loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him.” The good news is that, when we love Jesus by giving over our lives to his will, God will love us by sharing with us his life by living within us.

4B21.   Deuteronomy 18:15-20.    God had spoken to his People through Moses.  Moses prophesied that another prophet or prophets would come to God’s People to tell them what God wants them to hear.  A prophet is given authority by God to be the spokesperson of God who himself is the source of all authority.  Authority must be listened to and obeyed or else the disobedient one will be punished.  Even worse, God will kill anyone who claims to be a prophet but is not.  God had given the Hebrews the Law or Torah and the prophets.  The God of the Old Testament was never far from his People.  Even more, the God of the New Testament lives both within us individually and as a community, the Church.  God makes his life-giving presence felt in each way.

Mark 1:21-28.  This Sunday’s Gospel says, “The people were astonished at his (Jesus’) teaching, for he taught them as on having authority and not as one of the scribes (who drew their authority from the Scriptures).”  The divine authority rested in the person of Jesus.  Out of that authority divinely invested in himself he spoke.   The unclean spirit or demon recognized that authority invested in Jesus when he said, “I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”   Our reading continues later, “What is this? A new teaching with authority. He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him.”  The Gospel from the past Sunday’s Baptism of the Lord (Mark 1:11) reads, “And a voice came down from the heavens, ‘You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.’” Jesus’ authority is divine.  Listen & obey him or else!

1 Corinthians 7:32-35.  Paul is not telling the Corinthians to be unmarried but he does point out that our ultimate goal is to please the Lord.   To please the Lord is to respond positively to our calling or vocation and not to do whatever we feel like doing.  The calling to the priesthood or consecrated life (religious sister or brother) allows one to have a greater freedom to focus in on pleasing the Lord in that there should be fewer worldly distractions.  When we meet the Lord on Judgment Day, our past life will be read out to us.  That is our judgment.  Whom did we choose to please: God or whatever or whomever else and to what degree for each one?

4B18.   Deuteronomy 18:15-20.   “Moses spoke, “A prophet like me will the Lord, your God, raise up; to him shall you listen.”  “And the Lord said to me, ’I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their kin and will put my words into his mouth.” Perhaps these words were referring to someone else closer to the time of Moses but we interpret them to eventually refer to Jesus.

Mark 1:21-28.  “The people were astonished at his teaching, for ‘Jesus’ taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes.”  The scribes taught by quoting the Scriptures or the great teachers, in other words, they had no authority in themselves.  Jesus, however, taught with authority because he was the Messiah.  As God said in our first reading, I “will put my words into his mouth.”  God spoke through him and in him.  Not only did he speak with the power to pronounce the truth  from him as its very source without referring to any other but also to command the unclean sprits to obey him.  “All were amazed” and “astonished at his teaching.”  As the second reading said last week, get beyond “the world in its present form.”  There is something far greater now here. Recognize in Jesus something utterly unique and remarkable that God is doing.

1 Corinthians 7:32-35.   It is not a question of our choosing to be married or unmarried but of discerning what is God’s will or calling for us.  In any case, Paul calls us not to be so busy and lost in the things of this world that we are so distracted that we forget what is most important, to please the Lord first and foremost.  Let us accomplish the things of this world that are assigned to us by the will of the Lord yet always maintaining an adherence to the Lord without distraction.  We live in the smallness of the present but with a focus always on the God who desires for us the greatness of his eternity.

3A21.    Jonah 3:1-5, 10.   When the people of Nineveh heard from Jonah that God would destroy Nineveh in forty days, they believed God.  They turned from their evil way and repented.  God saw their actions of repentance and did not do as he had threatened.  In doing God’s will rather than their own sinful will, they were saying by their actions that God was the ruler and king over their lives, and nothing and no one else.

Mark 1:21-28.     Jesus began his public ministry “after John had been arrested,” “proclaiming the gospel of God: ‘This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel.’”  Those who belong to the kingdom of this world come under Satan, the ruler of this world. (John 15:19 & 16:11)  In John 18: 36b, Jesus said to Pilate, “My kingdom does not belong to this world.”    Jesus called Simon and Andrew, James and John to follow him.”  Those who follow Jesus abandon the call of the devil and this world to follow them.  Empowered by the grace of the Holy Spirit those who follow Jesus have chosen to belong to God and God’s Will. (John 17:6)  By his very presence in our lives, Jesus conquers the world for those who follow him. (John 16:33d)  Jesus enables us to be safe from the evil one even though we remain in this world.  (John 17:12) We live in the time of fulfillment in that we have been enabled by the Holy Spirit to have God as our life and not this world as our life.  God is our King and not Satan.

1 Corinthians 7:29-31.   Paul writes, “The time is running out; and then he writes: “For the world in its present form is passing away.”  When we look at our present time on this earth from the perspective that our life after leaving this earth is for an eternity, then we can envision that “time is running out,” and that “the world in its present form is passing away” for us.  People of this world live with the mindset that their life is from ‘cradle to grave’.  As followers of Jesus we always live in eternity, now and forever.

3B18.   Jonah 3:1-5, 10.  The Lord sent Jonah to Nineveh to call the inhabitants, who were pagan enemies of the Jewish people, to repent for their sins.  “They proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth.”  Seeing their repentance, God “repented of the evil that he had threatened to do to them.”  Last Sunday God with all his authority (“you are not your own”), entered into our world.  This Sunday in all his authority he calls all the world to repentance, to turn from ungodly ways to godly ways.

Mark 1:14-20.  John the Baptist has been arrested by Herod, leaving the center stage open to the one is greater than he.  Jesus proclaims, “This is the time of fulfillment.  The kingdom of God is at hand.  Repent; and believe in the gospel.” Jesus brings the presence of his kingdom into this world (cf. John 18:36-37).  The Scriptures that foretold of the coming of the Messiah are now to be fulfilled.  Jesus is commanding us to turn away from believing in anything but the gospel or good news that he brings us.  Jesus replaces the old Israel with its twelve tribes by now beginning to select his twelve Apostles.  Although they abandoned their nets now to become “fishers of men,” later they are pictured as plying their trade because they still needed to work for food.  Jesus in this gospel twice uses the expression that they “followed him.”  The kingdom of God came to them through the presence of Jesus himself, his words and his actions.  The person of God is at the very center of our faith.  God uses the institution of the Church, the people of God, the Church’s teachings, liturgy, sacraments, the Scriptures and many other ways to make himself and his divine life present to us.  It is really God Himself who is with us as the essence of revelation.  Our religion is centered in God and everything else is a help to have God as the very center of our lives.

1 Corinthians 7:29-31.  “I tell you brothers and sister, the time is running out.” And at the end of this reading it says: “For this world in its present form is passing away.”  The message is clearly not to live ingrained in the way things are in the ordinary world of today but to realize that as time goes on everything is going to change according to the designs of God and not the powers of this world.  Loosen your grip on things so to let God take hold instead of you holding on.

2B20.    1 Samuel 3:3b-10, 19.  This reading says, “At that time Samuel was not familiar with the Lord, because the Lord had not revealed anything to him as yet.”  When Eli, Samuel’s teacher and master, realizes that the Lord was speaking to Samuel, Eli tells Samuel to respond by saying, ‘Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”  Spiritual life is a whole dimension beyond physical life.  Spiritual life is the developing of a relationship with the invisible God, as the loving Lord of our lives.  It requires faith to take a trusting, humble step beyond the security of living in just a physical world where our bodies are what life is all about.   The spiritual life is based on prayer which is an ongoing communication with the God who is life for us.  The spiritual life is living completely dependent on God.

John 1:35-42.  John the Baptist refers to Jesus as the Lamb of God.  In John 1:29b, John calls Jesus, “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world”, which is to say that Jesus is the Messiah.  John mentioned to two of his followers that Jesus, who was walking by, was the Lamb of God.  One of those two was “Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter.”  Andrew brought his brother Simon to Jesus, who adopted Simon as one of his own by renaming him Peter.  That was Jesus‘ way of calling Peter to be one of his Apostles.  Prayer is not a monologue where we talk to the invisible God and he just listens without responding.  Prayer is a dialogue where God also speaks to us but usually not in words that are audible.  We learn how to listen by his enabling us to interpret the signs that he sends to us as his way of communicating with us.  That gift from him to us grows and develops as our relationship with the invisible God deepens, as we draw closer and closer to him, as we fall more and more in love with him.

1 Corinthians 6:13c-15a, 17-20.  This reading says, “Whoever is joined to the Lord becomes one Spirit with him.” The goal of our spiritual growth is to become one with the Lord while still maintaining our individuality.  We are flesh just as Jesus became flesh but at the same time retaining and growing in the spiritual.  “The body is not for immorality, but for the Lord.”  In biology we are listed as one of the animals of this earth.  However, we are not to be governed by our animal instincts and demands but by our calling to be children of God.  Non-human animals do not have a morality but we humans do.  “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?  For you have been purchased at a price.  Therefore glorify God in your body.” We are not the god of ourselves doing whatever we may wish; only God is the God of our lives.  In the ongoing development of our faith lives we more and more recognize him and interact with him as God and Lord over us.  We are not our own but one of his.  Living here on earth now as one of his, later he will take us into his home in heaven as our God and Lord for all eternity.