Love as Jesus Loves
by Fr. David M. Knight

July 23, 2024
Tuesday of the Sixteenth Week of Ordinary Time
Memorial Saint Bridget
Lectionary 396
Mi 7:14-15, 18-20/Mt 12:46-50
Micah 7:14-20: This last reading from Micah “closes with a prayer for national restoration and a beautiful expression of trust in the pardoning mercy of God:
who removes guilt and pardons... who does not persist in anger forever, but delights rather in clemency... treading underfoot our guilt. You will cast into the depths of the sea all our sins. You will show faithfulness... as you have sworn to our fathers from days of old.
When there is a discouraging response to our attempts to minister to each other—to God’s people or those invited to be his people—we need to keep in mind the victory Christ has won over guilt and death; that is, over sin and all of its consequences. (See Romans 5:8-21; 6:3-23; 7:4 to 8:39.)
At the end of time, when Christ returns in triumph to “to gather up all things in himself,” then we will see that God “has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.” The Church will be perfect when we have all come “to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ.” In the meantime, we must minister with the “steadfast love” of God himself, as modeled by Jesus. (See Ephesians 1:10, 22-23; 4:13; Exodus 20:6; 34:6; John 13:34; 15:12; Romans 5:5-8.)
Matthew 12:46-50: We know very well, especially if we minister to them, that none of Jesus’ followers are perfect. Nor are his ministers. The Church includes—and embraces—everything from the best to the worst. But when Jesus was preaching, he gave his hearers priority over his own mother and blood relatives asking to speak with him:
Extending his hands to his disciples, he said, “There are my mother and my brothers. Whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is brother and sister and mother to me.”
What is the cut-off point for “doing the will of the Father”? Jesus was pointing to his disciples, and “disciple” ” means “learner,” which means still in training.
But “disciple” does mean one trying to listen and learn. Would Jesus call “brother and sister and mother” the “mindlessly mediocre” who just vegetate in the Church, and the “stiff-necked Pharisees” who resist every appeal to open their hearts to the Holy Spirit, obstinately refusing to grow in light and love? Actually, he does.
If we have been “born from above” by “water and Spirit,” and have not committed “spiritual suicide” by truly “mortal” sin, we are children of the Father and brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ. And must treat others as such. This is a guideline for ministry.
Initiative: Love as Jesus loves. Look to the mystery of what each one is.
Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry

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