Have mercy on me and open my mind

Wednesday 3 June 2020

Have mercy on me and open my mind 

Cf. Wis 3: 6-7, 9

As gold in the furnace, the Lord put his chosen to the test;

as sacrificial offerings, he took them to himself;

and in due time they will be honoured,

and grace and peace will be with the chosen of God.

Prayer:

Jesus, you have risen from the dead and live among us. Through your Holy Spirit, show us the way to meet you. Speak to us and grant us the grace that we may never lose hope in your promises. May we all come into your Kingdom

First reading

2 Timothy 1:1-3,6-12 ·

God's gift is the Spirit of power, love and self-control

From Paul, appointed by God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus in his design to promise life in Christ Jesus; to Timothy, dear child of mine, wishing you grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and from Christ Jesus our Lord.

Night and day I thank God, keeping my conscience clear and remembering my duty to him as my ancestors did, and always I remember you in my prayers. That is why I am reminding you now to fan into a flame the gift that God gave you when I laid my hands on you. God’s gift was not a spirit of timidity, but the Spirit of power, and love, and self-control. So you are never to be ashamed of witnessing to the Lord, or ashamed of me for being his prisoner; but with me, bear the hardships for the sake of the Good News, relying on the power of God who has saved us and called us to be holy – not because of anything we ourselves have done but for his own purpose and by his own grace. This grace had already been granted to us, in Christ Jesus, before the beginning of time, but it has only been revealed by the Appearing of our saviour Christ Jesus. He abolished death, and he has proclaimed life and immortality through the Good News; and I have been named its herald, its apostle and its teacher.

It is only on account of this that I am experiencing fresh hardships here now; but I have not lost confidence, because I know who it is that I have put my trust in, and I have no doubt at all that he is able to take care of all that I have entrusted to him until that Day.

Prayerful reflection

Though scholars say that this letter is most probably not written by Paul but by someone, who, according to the custom of the day, wrote in the style of Paul and gave it his name, it is inspired by the Holy Spirit. Whoever wrote it, it is God’s Word and gives us God’s message.

“I am reminding you now to fan into a flame the gift that God gave you when I laid my hands on you”. All who are baptised and confirmed have received the fullness of the Holy Spirit. Jesus tells us that the Father is only too happy to send the Holy Spirit on those who ask for him (Luke 11:13). The Holy Spirit, God himself, is ever ready to give us his gifts to build up our brothers and sisters and to strengthen ourselves. We need to cultivate fellowship and communion with him. He is a Person who is the Paraclete. Paraclete is a Greek word conveying the idea of one who is ever at our side to help us effectively in any situation we may find ourselves in. We must constantly throughout the day be calling on the Spirit of God to assist us. Do it with expectant faith and see miracles happen for you daily. 

“bear the hardships” “relying on the power of God”. The Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, is always at our side ready to give us the power of God. We shouldn’t struggle on our own.

“He abolished death, and he has proclaimed life and immortality through the Good News”.  This is the great achievement of Jesus for us. It cost him a life of suffering and death on a Cross. With immense gratitude rejoice in his gift. We will not know the disintegration of death.

Psalm (Pray the Psalm as your response to God's Word)

Psalm 123:1-2

To you, O Lord, I lift up my eyes.

To you have I lifted up my eyes,

you who dwell in the heavens;

my eyes, like the eyes of slaves

on the hand of their lords.

To you, O Lord, I lift up my eyes.

Like the eyes of a servant

on the hand of her mistress,

so our eyes are on the Lord our God

till he show us his mercy.

To you, O Lord, I lift up my eyes.

Alleluia!

I am the resurrection and the life, says the Lord;

whoever believes in me will never die.

Alleluia!

____________________

Gospel

Mark 12:18-27

The God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob is the God of the living

Some Sadducees – who deny that there is a resurrection – came to him and they put this question to him, ‘Master, we have it from Moses in writing, if a man’s brother dies leaving a wife but no child, the man must marry the widow to raise up children for his brother. Now there were seven brothers. The first married a wife and then died leaving no children. The second married the widow, and he too died leaving no children; with the third it was the same, and none of the seven left any children. Last of all the woman herself died. Now at the resurrection, when they rise again, whose wife will she be, since she had been married to all seven?’

Jesus said to them, ‘Is not the reason why you go wrong, that you understand neither the scriptures nor the power of God? For when they rise from the dead, men and women do not marry; no, they are like the angels in heaven. Now about the dead rising again, have you never read in the Book of Moses, in the passage about the Bush, how God spoke to him and said: I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob? He is God, not of the dead, but of the living. You are very much mistaken.’

Prayerful reflection

‘The people who matter’ among the Jews, - the chief priests, the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the elders etc., are all opposed to Jesus, ‘this preacher from a provincial village of Nazareth never mentioned in the Scriptures, without training, not belonging to any of their groups, just an ordinary layman without any religious authority’. ‘Who is this fellow to tell us? Well, this rabble that follow him. They know nothing’. Today the Sadducees try to make Jesus look a fool. But Jesus is the wisdom of God embodied in a human being.

“you understand neither the scriptures” All Scripture is inspired and useful for our instruction and spiritual growth (St. Paul to Timothy). God, however, did not write the Scriptures, nor did he dictate them. He inspired ordinary human beings with his divine message. They listened and understood according to their human and cultural way. They may not have understood that the thoughts in their head were from God. They may well have thought, that their ideas were their own – just as we do. Then for the instruction of others, they wrote a message in their own language and according to the way they thought in their culture – just as we do. We cannot read the Bible as if we wrote it in the 21st century. After understanding the way people of that day thought and wrote, we must distil the message of God for us today. For this we need the Holy Spirit’s help. He inspired the sacred writer, he will also inspire you, the sacred reader, if you open yourself to him.

“nor the power of God?” Of God, we humans know very little. Our knowledge at best is minute. Before God the whole universe, which scientists struggle to understand and which we find bewildering, is no more than a spec of dust on the scales – Isaiah chapter 40. Can an ant with its little brain understand me, then how can I understand anything about God. The whole universe is not even an ant before God, then what of me or you? we know he exists (Romans chapter 1). We know he must be infinite in all perfections. Beyond that we know nothing. Jesus who has come from God has taught some other truths about God, not many, but of immense importance. He revealed to us that God is One and also Three, that he is the primordial Family from which every family takes its name. He taught us that God loves us, each one of us, infinitely and that he will do anything for us so that we can live in his Family as his children for ever. To show us this in a way we ‘puny human beings’ (Isaiah) can understand, he became a human being and lived among us. He has revealed himself now in a human way. Look at Jesus and you look at a God, but in a human way. He chose to save us from our rebellious sin by the extreme form of human suffering on a Cross to reveal how much God loves us.

Can we know what his infinite love, power and wisdom will devise for us when we arrive home with him? “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, nor has it entered into the heart of human beings to even imagine what God has prepared for those who love him” – Isaiah quoted by St. Paul.

Let us believe the Word of God and let us live in hope and respond to the promise by a life of love, for God and for everyone he has created and for the wonderful universe in which we live now.

Can you sit and relax in the presence of God now? This is prayer. ‘Father, have mercy on me and open my mind to you’

Rm 6: 8

If we have died with Christ,

we believe that we shall also live with Christ, alleluia.

 Prayer

Lord Jesus, through your Word, may we come to know you. May we, who through your infinite mercy, believe in you, come one day to share, in our own bodies, the glory of your Resurrection, which is beyond our imagination.