Welcome to my blog. Peace be with you.
Today is the first Gospel passage, we learn how
we must first sit at the Lord’s feet and listen and do what he wants us to do. We
are not to do our own thing and then ask him to accept it.
In the second passage Jesus teaches how we are to
pray. We pray to God our Father, we acknowledge is greatness and we ask for our
spiritual good.
Wednesday 7
October 2020
Listening to
Jesus in Prayer
Gospel (for 6th October)
Luke 10:38-42
Martha works;
Mary listens
1.
Jesus came to a village,
2.
and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her
house.
3.
She had a sister called Mary, who sat down at the
Lord’s feet and listened to him speaking
4.
. Now Martha who was distracted with all the
serving said, ‘Lord, do you not care that my sister is leaving me to do the
serving all by myself? Please tell her to help me.’
5.
But the Lord answered: ‘Martha, Martha,’ he said
‘you worry and fret about so many things, and yet few are needed, indeed only
one.
6.
It is Mary who has chosen the better part;
7.
it is not to be taken from her.’
Prayerful reflection
Martha welcomes Jesus into her house. So should
we. We should welcome him daily into our hearts and into our homes. This is something
we should do deliberately and not something we take for granted.
We welcome Jesus to first listen to him. In prayer
we must listen to him and he will guide our life. For this we must have an
ongoing relationship with him. Our actions should flow from our prayer. Mary has
it right. She is sitting and listening. Later she will act in accordance with
the words of Jesus.
Martha’s mistake is not that she is busy working
for Jesus. She should have consulted him first. She too should have first
listened to what Jesus had to say. If Jesus were to come to our house, would we
leave him and do our own thing? What a missed opportunity it would be.
As a result, she is upset and agitated with
trying to get things done on time. Jesus will always give us peace.
Gospel
Luke 11:1-4
How to pray
2.
and when he had finished, one of his disciples
said, ‘Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.’
3.
He said to them, ‘Say this when you pray:
4.
‘“Father, may your name be held holy,
5.
your kingdom come;
6.
give us each day our daily bread,
7.
and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive
each one who is in debt to us
8.
And do not put us to the test.”’
Prayerful reflection
Jesus teaches us how to pray. We pray to God our
Father. We are his children and are to have a warm and adult relationship with
him. While in this world we are to continue the work that he gave to his only-begotten
Son, Jesus, who in his turn handed on to us. This work is the proclamation of
the Good News of God’s love and the salvation won for us by Jesus.
We pray also to Jesus, for he is God along with
the Father. But Jesus as our mediator with the Father offers our prayers to the
Father. He lives to intercede for us as it says in the letter to the Hebrews
7:25.
Our prayer is first focused on praise and
gratitude to God the Father for all he has done – may the whole world recognize
him as Father and may he rule over the world. His rule is not imposed from
above. We are to accept him as our Father and King. The Father reigns in love
and we accept his reign in love. If he rules over us, then we will all prosper.
We are to pray for our daily bread. There are two
kinds of bread. Natural bread will give us natural health. In as far as it
goes, it is good. But it cannot give us immortality. There is the second kind
of food. Jesus gives this food and it is real food. My flesh is real food and
my blood is real drink. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood will live
forever.
Never in the Gospel are we to simply pray for
forgiveness of our sins. Forgiveness by God is always linked with our forgiving
of those who sin against us. Only if we forgive, will we be forgiven.
We are weak human beings, we pray that we be
spared temptation.
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