21C22.    Isaiah 66:18-21.   God will show his glory to all peoples so that they will worship him in Jerusalem with the Hebrews.

Psalm 117: “Go out to all the world and tell the Good News.”  “Praise the Lord, all you nations; glorify him, all you peoples!”

Luke 13:22-39.   Jesus says that many will attempt to be saved but will be too weak to be strictly adherent to Jesus.  They will think that it was enough to have had some passing acquaintance with him and that it was adequate to just be a Jew to be saved.  They will see the Hebrew prophets in heaven along with many non-Jews but they will be cast out.  Salvation is only achieved by being submissive and obedient to Jesus.

Hebrews 12:5-7, 11-13.   We are exhorted to remember what God has taught us: to suffer through the trials and difficulties that God has sent us so to learn the lessons that God has given us.  “At the time, all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain, yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who are trained by it.” Jesus, “Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered; and when he was made perfect (holy), he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.”  (Hebrews 5:8-9)  God will show his glory to all who live as his children.

21C19.   Isaiah 66:18-21.   “I come to gather the nations of every language; they shall come and see my glory.”  God now chooses all peoples as his people and not just the Hebrews.

Luke 13:22-30.   “Someone asked Jesus, “Lord, will only a few people be saved?” He answered them, “Strive to enter through the narrow gate.”  The narrow gate is that one must do the will of God and nothing else.  Jesus said in John 15:14, “You are my friends if you do what I command you.”  We must strive, make every effort or do our utmost to obey the will of God.  In verse 27 b & c, Jesus said, “I do not know where you are from. Depart from me all you evildoers!”  They were friends of Jesus socially but not friends of the will of God.  They let him walk into their lives as acquaintances on the street but not into their hearts as the source of their life.  They did not come to Jesus from or out of a life lived in God but from some other source that treated God as someone only tangentially relevant to their lives.  Their rejection of Jesus as the Messiah earned them the title, ‘evildoers’. For that they will go to a hell that is a “wailing and grinding of teeth,” while their ancestors will go to the ‘kingdom of God’.  While they were born into the people of God, they will not get the inheritance that was to be theirs because they did not choose to follow the will of God so as to enter through the narrow gate.  Others, who were not born into the people God but nonetheless did “strive to enter through the narrow gate,” “will recline at table in the kingdom of God.”

Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-24a.   “Endure your trials as ‘discipline’; God treats you as sons.”  “At the time, all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain, yet later it brings the peaceful fruit or righteousness to those who are trained by it.”  In Hebrews 5:8 we read, “Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered.”  God gives us life to be lived advancing day by day on the road to heaven.  Daily we follow Jesus who gives us the Holy Spirit so to enable us to grow spiritually in a material world that poses many great obstacles to our entering “through the narrow gate.”  In Matthew 19:25c-26, the disciples said, “’Who then can be saved?’ Jesus looked at them and said, ‘For human beings this is impossible, but for God all things are possible’” Paul writes in Philippians 4:13, “I have strength for everything through him who empowers me.” The joy that problems and difficulties give us is that by necessity we are driven to be much closer to God than peaceful times can ever do.  We are forced to go back and back to God to train our mortal flesh to be spiritual.  When the day our judgement comes, let us make God proud of the work he has done in us and through us.

20C22.    Jeremiah 38:4-6, 8-10.  This is that classic battle between the forces of good and evil.  Jeremiah, as spokesperson or prophet for God, was speaking against those who were not following the will of God and so they tried to put Jeremiah to death.  Jeremiah was rescued as God intervened for him through a royal court official.

Luke 12: 49-53.  “Jesus said to his disciples: ‘I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!  There is a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!  Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.’”  Jesus, “the Messiah, the Son of God” (John 20:31b) was sent into this world to conquer the world (John 16:33c) and to protect those who belong to God (John 17:12) from those who belonged to the world and who hated those who belonged to God. (John 15:19) The symbolism of baptism that Jesus speaks of is one in which the adult person who is being baptized submerges into the water as a sign of his dying to all that is not of God to rise out of the water to live a new life in all that is of the Lord.  So baptism here symbolizes the death and resurrection that Jesus would go through to condemn Satan and conquer the forces of this world. (John 16:11 & 33c)

Hebrews 12:1-4.  The image of ‘running the race’ is one pushing ourselves to the limit to put out our very best as the way of living our faith.  It is natural ‘to go with the flow’ and just live life as an everyday routine.   Instead Jesus is calling on us to be on fire with the love of the Lord, to be the salt that makes the flavor our faith come alive and to be the light that brings to light the glory of Lord who is life for us.  Life is a “struggle against sin” because the devil, the world and our own bodies make sin look delicious.  “For the sake of the joy” that lies before us in heaven and the joy of walking now in the Lord, let us endure the many crosses that this world can put in our path.

Psalm 40.   “Lord, come to my aid!”   “You are my help and my deliverer; O my God, hold not back!”

20C19.   Jeremiah 38:4-6, 8-10.   Jeremiah had prophesized that, since the King of Jerusalem had made an alliance with Egypt against the Chaldeans, the Chaldeans would defeat Judah and take everyone into captivity.  For this, Jeremiah was hated and thrown into a muddy cistern to die.   However, God was merciful by sending a court official to get the king to have Jeremiah drawn out of the cistern so that he not die there.

Psalm 40.   God had come to the aid of Jeremiah and will come to the aid of anyone who calls out to him.  He is our help and deliverer.

Luke 12:49-53.  “Jesus said to his disciples: ‘I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were blazing!’”  In John 12:31, 14:30 & 16:11, Jesus refers to Satan as the ruler of this world who will be judged and condemned. Those who are followers of this world, its ways and its leader, Satan, are dedicated to fighting against Jesus and his followers to the very end.  Jesus said to Pilate in John 18:36: “My kingdom does not belong to this world.  If my kingdom did belong to this world, my attendants would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews.  But as it is, my kingdom is not here.”  Jesus’ followers do not belong to this world (John 17:14) any more than Jesus does.  There can be no peace between Satan and his followers and Jesus and his followers, only war to the end.  To be at peace with Jesus means to be at war with Satan and what is his, this world.  “There is a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!”  The baptism Jesus is referring to is the fire of pain and death in which he will be immersed and subjected to by Satan and this world.  Waging war against Satan and this world has and will always give us pain and suffering but will also always result in glorious victory for those who remain loyal to the Lord.

Hebrews 12:1-4.  Paul writes, “Persevere in running the race that lies before us while keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith.”  What can be a more wonderful way to grow in holiness than to have in mind and heart that I am now following Christ, saying within ourselves, “Lead me, Lord, lead me!  Jesus said to his first Apostles, “Come, follow me.” The ordinary daily tasks of life and even the seductive temptations of sin can lead us to lose focus on the Lord.

 

19C22.    Wisdom 18:6-9.    The Hebrews in slavery in Egypt put their faith in their God who was to deliver them.  They waited for salvation to come because they knew that the Lord was their God and they were his people.

Luke 12:32-48.  Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not be afraid any longer, little flock, for your Father is pleased to give you the kingdom.”  However our God will only give the kingdom to those who treasure God as their God and not to those who instead of treasuring God are in love with the things of this world.  Look with great desire for the day when the Lord will call us to be with him forever.  Live and wait in expectation for him to call us to be completely his in heaven.  Always live ready to be called to judgment at any moment.  Make certain you do not get caught up in the pleasures of this world.  If you do, you will not be ready to enter the next.  To whatever degree we are lost in the things and ways of this world we will be purged or cleansed in Purgatory to make us ready to enter into our Father’s kingdom.  God does not waste his time and energy pouring his grace into us to help us to become his true sons and daughters without demanding results in our spiritual growth. Jesus said in Matthew 5:48: “So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”  For the love he has poured into us he demands that we become loving.  “Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more.”

Hebrews 11:1-2, 8-19.   “Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen.”  Faith is that by believing in God I already have what is hoped for even though I do not have it physically in hand.  Faith is trusting that God is true to being our Father whose love cannot fail.  Faith means that we are willing to wait on God’s good pleasure confident that we will never be denied God’s goodness.

19C19.   Wisdom 18:6-9.   The Hebrew people had sworn their commitment to God because they had the faith that God would never let them down.  “Your people awaited the salvation of the just and the destruction of their foes.”

Psalm 33.   “Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.”  The Lord “is our help and our shield.  May your kindness, O Lord, be upon us who have put our hope in you.”

Luke 12:32-48.  In this Gospel Jesus is calling upon his people to enthusiastically prepare themselves to be called to judgement by acting in way that is pleasing to God, our Lord and Master. For those who do so, they will be rewarded; those who do not, they will be punished.  Jesus also makes it clear that there will be proportionality.  To the degree that we do not serve God’s will, we will to that degree be punished.  Finally Jesus says, “Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more.”  In other words, those who have received more graces from the Lord, more will be expected of them.

Hebrews 11:1-2, 8-19.  Believing that something is true because we put our trust in someone (God) who says and knows that it is true; but, not seeing or finding from our own investigation that it is true, is faith.  Abraham believed the promise God made to him, that from Abraham there was to be God’s own people, who were to be given their own homeland.  Abraham entrusted his future into the hands of God without having any evidence or proof that he had outside of the fact that God said it.

Seeing is not so much believing as it is knowing because we see for ourselves and have the truth. Faith is not k

nowing but trusting that some else knows.  Believing means that we don’t see or know the truth firsthand yet believe because we surrender our judgment into the hands of the one in whom we entrust our belief that they have given to us the knowledge of the truth, a knowledge that we did not have on our own.  Faith requires that we surrender the judgment of what is true to the one in whom we entrust ourselves. God knows firsthand but we do not.  We trust that God is passing on to us the truth that God himself knows.   Living each day trusting in God leads us to become people of a deeper and deeper faith in God because he shows his infinite faithfulness all the way to our heavenly homeland.  He is an ever faithful Father.  At times he allows our faith to be challenged as he did with Abraham in the case of his son Isaac; but the challenges will help us to be evermore trusting in the Lord, as he enables us to work through those challenges.  Isaac’s spared life was a symbol or sign to Abraham that God never fails those who entrust themselves to him.

18C22.    Ecclesiastes 1:2; 2:21-23.   This Old Testament book is saying that people often live their lives in a pointless, meaningless way.  In all this universe there is an endless circle of creation and destruction.  What is here today will be gone tomorrow, only to be replaced by something that will be gone the next day.  In a sense it is all in vain.  In itself and of itself, everything in this universe ends up being an endless cycle of pointlessness and meaninglessness.  God drains the worthlessness out of a life lived without God.  He is the point of it all.

Luke 12:13-21.  Someone asks Jesus that he help him to receive what he justly deserves.  However, Jesus is taken by the endless striving that he sees around him to live life just for the things of this world.  Jesus goes on relate a parable about a very successful, wealthy farmer who puts his sole faith in the material things of this world.  The value of material things terminates at the grave where we no longer possess even a body.  “Thus will it be for all who store up treasure for themselves but are not rich in what matters to God.”  True treasure is the treasure that is forever.

Colossians 3:1-5, 9-11.  “Seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.”  Of course, our bodies will die but our life continues on without our bodies.  If we live as if our life is our body, then we are acting as though we live a life that is pointless and in vain.  “You have taken off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed, for knowledge, in the image of its creator.”  Life is God, not our bodies and this earth.  “Christ is all and in all.”

18C19.    Ecclesiastes 1:2; 2:21-23.   This first reading makes the statement: “All things are vanity!”  It later continues on to say: “For what profit comes to man from all the toil and anxiety of heart with which he has labored under the sun?”  That seems to me to be saying that our human efforts fall short of achieving what we set out to do or of holding onto whatever we did achieve.  Psalm 90 says, “You turn man back to dust.”  In other words what growth there was over the years in our bodies, minds, and whatever else we were, is turned back to nothing but dust.  “All things are vanity!”  What we accomplish is a flash of light that disappears in the darkness.  What is done humanly, seemingly without God, is done in vain, useless.

Luke 12:13-21.  “Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, ’Teacher, tell my brother to share the inheritance with me.’ He replied to him, ‘Friend, who appointed me as your judge and arbitrator?’”   I understand Jesus’ reply to mean, “Here it is that I have come into this world to lead you to what is of value beyond this world.  You, however, insist on clinging to what is worldly and ignoring what is eternal.  The desire for worldly goods or greed are blinding to what is eternally good.  Filling up with the goods of this world will leave little or no room to have the life-giving presence of our God who makes us to be the good person we need to be to inherit eternal life.  Having goods is not the same as being good.  This world insists that having the goods of this world is all that matters. On the other hand, God insists that being good in his eyes is all that matters.  In the end all this world can give us is the rot or decay of the grave; in contrast God gives us the eternal and glorious life that flows from his love for us.

Colossians 3:1-5, 9-11.   “Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.”  Our baptism commits us to living a heavenly God-filled life while still living physically here on earth.  We have chosen to be infinitely more than just homo sapiens, just another animal of this world, born here to terminate in a grave here.  “For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.  When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with him in glory.  Put to death, then, the parts of you that are earthly.” “You have taken the old self with its practices and have put on the new self.”  That new self is still located in this world but now without this world as its life, only the life-giving presence of the Jesus for whom “Christ is all and in all.”

17C22.    Genesis 18:20-32.  Abraham walked toward Sodom with the divine guests for whom he had just served hospitality.  Then the Lord expressed to Abraham that “the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah (was) so great” that he had to see for himself.  “The Lord remained standing before Abraham.  Then Abraham drew nearer and said: ‘Will you sweep away the innocent with the guilty?’” For me what follows is a narrative analogous to a buyer wedeling down the price before a merchant in a Middle East bizarre.  The example that Abraham sets for us is that he, while always being respectful, was always persistent.

Luke 11:1-13.    Jesus himself was a person of prayer who in his humanity felt the need to live in relationship to the divine.     The prayer he taught his disciples is a prayer of relationship of a son to his father.  First, he shows an appreciation for the sacredness and divinity of his Father.  Secondly, he petitions that the reign of God come to fruition over a world that often chooses to be apart from God.  Thirdly, he asks for the infusion of God’s grace or life that enables us to live in the holy image and likeness of God.  Then he asks that we may live sharing in God’s sinless, holy nature as well as calling us to not to deny others to live in that same holiness by forgiving the ways in which others may have offended us.   Lastly, he admits to the fear that we may fall to the threat of this world’s challenge to our holiness.  Jesus’ call for us to be persistent, I believe, is a demand that prayer be an endless way of life by which we live out our faith daily.  We are to live in a never ending asking, knocking, and seeking because the Holy Spirit is the breathe of spiritual life without whom we become nothing more than just another animal of this earth.  Live in Our Father’s love or die spiritually.

Colossians 2:12-14.   We have all been sinners and so consequently “dead in transgressions.”  Paul writes, “He brought you (and us) to life along with him, having forgiven us all our transgressions.” Salvation comes from our Savior and not by our work but by our cooperation with his salvific activity.

 

17C19.   Genesis 18:20-32.   In the account of God’s dealing with Sodom and Gomorrah, God is pictured almost as a royal but human manager or overseer.  He is seen as one who needs to go down “to see whether or not their actions fully correspond to the cry against them,” as if God cannot see or know from heaven what is going on in the world. That same characterization of the Lord continues as Abraham bargains humbly but skillfully with his attempt to save the cities.  At the bazaar of the middle-east the opening asking price is not the final asking price but the beginning price at which to start the negotiations.  In our prayer life, is God someone we bargain or negotiate with or who already knows what his final answer will be no matter how much we want to bargain?  Personally I think that the Lord knows what he wants, no matter how much we try to make a deal BUT does not mind a negotiation process to get us to come to his terms.  In this episode I think that God wants us to realize he will do his most to save us, as he later did on the cross.

Luke 11:1-13.  Jesus himself was often going off to pray or communicate with his heavenly Father.  Seeing his example and that John had taught his followers to pray, one of his disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray.  First Jesus teaches them the ‘Our Father’; then the parable of the man who, having an unexpected guest, requested three loaves of bread from a friend to feed his guest.  At first the friend refused to get up from bed to give him the bread but then acquiesced because of his persistence.  Jesus’ point was that, if persistence will work with people who can be wicked, how much more it will work with our God, who only knows how to give what is good.  In fact, as Jesus said to Martha in last week’s Luke 10:42a, “There is need of only one thing,” that is, the Holy Spirit.  Our prayer should be persistent or patient with God, not because his patience will wear thin but because our patience is waiting on him for the good he will certainly give us in his good time.  To be people of faith means to live in God’s goodness.  “Give us each day our daily bread” is to live each day in the hand of God’s daily goodness. To treat God as the one who is truly and fully the God of our lives we must be daily totally dependent upon him.  Let us find that whatever goodness comes our way is from the hand of God.  Secular people will interpret the goodness that appears in our lives as only happenstance without any divine source.  When we pray: “Forgive us our sins for we ourselves forgive everyone in debt to us,” we are obligating ourselves to be good to others as God is good to us.  On the phrase “do not subject us to the final test” I was only able to find that at the end times some Jews believed there would be a final great test.  I can only wonder that Jesus was saying that, if we put our lives into his hands, he would take us through the final test by his death on the cross to our resurrection with him.

Colossians 2:12-14.   Baptism by immersion and then our emergence from the water is symbolic of our joining ourselves to Christ’s death and resurrection.  We were dead because of our sins and limiting ourselves to just a life in the flesh.  He brought us to spiritual life along with him by forgiving our sins and obliterating the bonds of the Jewish Law, “nailing it to the cross.”  Real life is Christ living in us, sharing his life with us.