Tuesday of the Sixth Week of Easter
May 7, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/050724.cfm

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About midnight, while Paul and Silas were praying
and singing hymns to God as the prisoners listened,
there was suddenly such a severe earthquake
that the foundations of the jail shook;
all the doors flew open, and the chains of all were pulled loose. 
When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open,
he drew his sword and was about to kill himself,
thinking that the prisoners had escaped.
But Paul shouted out in a loud voice,
“Do no harm to yourself; we are all here.”
Acts 16: 25-28

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As their persecutors try to imprison Paul and Silas, Divine Intervention shakes up their intentions! Not only are the disciples freed by the earthquake, but they courageously hang around the prison environs to salvage the guard for Christ.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We might prayerfully consider the interventions God has made in our lives – those unexpected turns in the road that eventually led us to grace. How have we responded?

We might also wish to pray for some little quakes of grace in our own lives and in the world where we need to be shaken up, released from unholy chains, and re-ordered in faith.

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Poetry: Unless the Grain of Wheat Falls – Irene Zimmerman, OSF

Easter!
But I’m still torn with grief,
disbelief.
I’m not ready yet!
I clutch the old familiar pain—
I’ve gotten used to the dark,
grown calluses against the rub of walls.
I feel secure confined within the grain. 

Easter!
This unseen Presence signed in Bread,
this utter homey-ness of meal
still leaves a loneliness that gnaws.
It almost would be easier
had you stayed dead.
I would not have to try to learn
to know you in this strange new way 

and when my time came, I could say
good-bye behind a finished smile,
without a thought or care
for those I had not fed.
But now to have to live from day to day
on Bread and promise of Bread—
to eat and pass the loaves along
and not to store! 

This call to grow to Easter ripeness
shakes my familiar ground,
quakes the very kernel of myself.
I thought I had secured my walls so well.
But you roll away, like a child’s toy,
the rock I had sealed against you
and make me an empty shell of wheat
to witness that you are alive in me.

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Music: Earthquake – by 2nd Life