Saturday of the Third Week in Ordinary Time
February 1, 2020
Today, in Mercy, David gets his comeuppance after his sinful forays.
The passage is hard to deal with. It suggests that God is vengeful, and gets us back for going against him. That’s not the God Who loves me.
Like much of the Old Testament, the writer is interpreting the circumstances of life in order to teach a lesson. The lesson here is not that God is a payback God. The core lesson is that our choices have repercussions, and should always be made in the light of God’s hope for us.
Sometimes in our own lives, we think of God as reacting in a human way to us – getting angry, forgetting us, paying us back, testing us, punishing us. Like the disciples in today’s storm-tossed boat, our faith is weak and maybe misdirected.
God is Love, and Love only. God is NEVER “I’ll getcha’ “. Deep faith directs us to find God’s love – God’s continuing call to intimacy – in every circumstance of our lives.
God didn’t kill David’s illegitimate son. It just happened, the way so much of life happens. We can blame God if we want to, but we’re missing the point.
The point is that God is with us in the inevitable joys and sorrows of our lives saying, as he did to his distraught shipmates:
“Why are you terrified?
Do you not yet have faith?”
Our Gospel assures us that God is with us, “sleeping” even in our rocky boat. By faith and prayer, we “wake God”, as we actually wake ourselves to the truth of God’s immutable, loving Presence in our lives.
Music: You Raise Me Up – Selah
Renee
I really enjoy your inspiring reflections but it takes away from the spiritual insights when you get into your political views.
I really don’t think that Lavish Mercy is the platform for this.
Someone called you the Mystic of the Mercys and I agree that God has given you great gifts in this regard. Thank you for sharing them.
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Thank you, Rosie, for your opinion. I appreciate the honesty and respect of your remark.Politics will always play a key role in my spirituality and will often be found in my reflections. I believe our deeply considered political actions are one way we demonstrate our understanding and commitment to the Gospel. If, at times, a partisan tone slips into my comments, I apologize. Like all of us, I struggle with what our political reality demands of me as a Christian. On Lavish Mercy, I work very hard to make my considerations applicable to all participants in our political and communitarian processes, as we all examine our consciences with regard to civic morality. This quote from Dietrich Bonhoeffer has been helpful to me: “Christianity stands or falls with its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness, and pride of power, and with its plea for the weak. Christians are doing too little to make these points clear … Christendom adjusts itself far too easily to the worship of power. Christians should give more offense, shock the world far more, than they are doing now.”
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Renee,
I loved your reflection this morning and the music you chose. Thanks for sharing so much of yourself!
Cathy Maguire
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Thanks, Cathy.❤️
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I am grateful for and appreciate your insights, Renee. I resonate with them and also with something Joan Chittister said some years ago- “We have to pray with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other.” After all, the Bible is political.
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❤️
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Thank you! This is wonderful! And as I was reading you post, Number 23:19-24 came to mind after reading it early this morning!
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