Aug 21st

Ok, I really cannot relate to the first reading of today. I think that this is because it is a very Old Testament reading. The God that is represented in the Old Testament is a very different God than is represented in the New Testament. He is shown as an angry God and a jealous God. So what changed? Why the one God at the start and another God after that?

I don’t know. But it does seem strange does it not? I keep wondering if I am reading everything out of context but I read a little before and a little after the passage and what I am struck by is how God judges us. Did God have to be so cruel to show us how merciful He can be?

Well, I think He probably had to. I think that He had to show us how much we did not deserve it but that He did it anyway. The New Testament completes the Old Testament in that the OT shows how man in general continued to disappoint Him and how He in general continued to show us how much He loved us.

I guess the best way to describe it in my own terms and in my own experience is by comparing it to, big surprise, my own father. When I was young and I did foolish stuff, I would get punished by my dad. But as I got older, I learnt from all the silly things I did in my past and I endeavoured not to do them again. But you know what, it was when I really understood the extent of his love for me that I began really understanding why the crazy things I did hurt him so much. Only when I learnt how much my own father sacrificed for me, did I really know how much I disappointed Him.

I guess in a similar way, God behaves just like a father to all of us. When I was watching “The Passion” and I saw how much Jesus was suffering, the thought that was ever present in my mind was how much hurt and pain I had caused Him. Every lash of the whip was a representation of the sins I had committed. Every Nail that pierced His flesh represented the good acts that I chose not to do. God sacrificed Himself for me. I don’t think anybody else believes that their God sacrificed themselves for normal ordinary human beings.

But we are different. We believed that God sacrificed Himself for us. The thing is, He did not sacrifice Himself for any ordinary human beings, He sacrificed Himself for us. We are His chosen people, His royal priesthood, a people set apart. Set apart from what? Set apart from everybody else. God did not sacrifice Himself for anybody. He did it for us. So why did he choose us?

I don’t know. Seems like that’s a common thread today yah? Let’s see, so I don’t know and I am lazy, sounds just like me. Anyway, I don’t know because I think only you and God know why you’re chosen. I remember someone, I think it was Leo, who said that the two most important days of our lives were, firstly, the day you came into this earth and second, the day you discovered why.

How true is that? In my last reflection, I wrote about how we are all searching for the Way. So it is very understandable that I think that the day we figured out where we are going to be one of the two most important days of our lives. It sucks to not know where we are going because it feels like we are doing all this work for nothing. When we figure out our direction then everything begins to have meaning. And when everything starts to have meaning then we will look forward to everyday.

When I was helping out with the Rag presentation thing for my hall, (we lost by the way. I am sad.) I remember coming up with the catchphrase that everyday was not just another day. I felt that that was a very important idea to bring across. Everyday brings opportunities for us to take advantage of and we need to realise that. We tend to get caught up in the routine of everyday and so “everyday” becomes a bad word synonymous with being boring and mundane.

Everyday is so much more than that. Everyday becomes mundane only because we make it so. (Oh yes, another theme you will see a lot in my writing apart from the facts that I don’t know and that I am lazy is my staunch belief that everything is a choice.) We have to choose to make everyday special and do that.

In every good relationship, the partners have to make each other feel that everyday is special because they are with the ones they love. That is why one of the most important tips in men’s magazines, (I’m just guessing ‘cause I don’t read such trash, bah.) is to surprise your loved ones on ordinary days. Yes, anniversaries are important but it’s the everyday that is most important.

Yes, Sundays and Days of Obligation are important but it is serving God everyday that is most important. There is a need for all of us to delight in the everyday because everyday is another day spent with the Lord. When Belinda Carlisle sang about Heaven being a place on Earth, she probably did not know how right she was. Heaven becomes a place on Earth when we spend it in God’s presence because a simple understanding of Heaven is a place where our souls live in unison with God.

So, when we read in the Gospel of the day that Jesus tells the rich man’s son that the only way to heaven is to give up all his riches, this might be what he means. The man in question had to give up the everyday and live the Everyday. He had to give up the life he was living and start living with God as his sole focus. It was not enough that he kept the commandments and it would do us well to remember that. Keeping the commandments means nothing if God is not the centre of our lives.

I was once told by a wise teacher of mine that it is not the sins we commit that we will be judged on but the good works we omit that will decide our fate. When our lives revolve around God, we will do the good work we are given a chance to because we are told that whatever we do to the least of the brethren is done unto God. Joan Osbourne said it best when she sang “What if God was one of us? Just a slob like one of us? Just a stranger on a bus? Tryin’ to make His way home…”

Well, forget “what if” because he is in our midst. Every time we give somebody what he or she does not deserve, we must remember that our God has given us what we do not deserve. He sees beyond our faults and our transgressions and sees instead who we really are and what we really need. He is truly our father and he treats us like any good father would treat their children.