Our Father Looks At The Heart
by Fr. David M. Knight
March 9, 2024
Saturday (Week III of Lent)
Lectionary No. 242
Hosea 6:1-6; Psalm5; Luke 18:9-14
"It is love that I desire… and knowledge of God." Hosea 6:6
The Pharisee in Luke 18 did not know God. He thought God wanted law observance. But God wants love.
If we believe those who keep God’s law are good Christians, and those who don’t are not, we are like the Pharisees. Jesus says people who are breaking God’s law, but feel terrible about it and are trying to change, are pleasing to God. People who find it easy to keep the rules, and feel they are better than others because of it, are not. They don’t know God. Or the New Law Jesus taught.
If we asked any of the Saints, “Are you keeping God’s law?” the answer would be, “I’m not even coming close!” To love God with our whole heart, and others no longer as ourselves, but as Jesus loves them (John 13:34), is beyond any perfection we reach on this earth.
In the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew, chapters 5-7) Jesus gives guidelines for living on the level of God. He teaches God’s ideals. We will reach them in heaven, because “when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is” (1John 3:2). Not before.
Until then we begin every Mass introducing ourselves as sinners: “I confess….”
If we know the Father, we will know ourselves as sinners, and simultaneously be afflicted and at peace.
ACTION: Read the Sermon on the Mount. Pragmatically.
PRAYER: “Father, be merciful to me, a sinner.”
Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry
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