Tag: <span>Omnipotence</span>

March 26, 2021March 8, 2021

Stoned?

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

Close as we are to Holy Week, today’s readings are a clear foreshadowing of those days.

The first reading speaks of those once favorable to the prophet, who now seek to trap him from every side.

The passage in the first reading prefigures the events of today’s gospel, wherein the Pharisees are ready to kill Jesus, to stone Him. If the gospel had gone differently, there would have been no Calvary, no crucifixion, and Jesus would have died here.

But it was not to be. Scriptures had foretold the manner of Jesus’ death; the events in the desert had foreshadowed it, where the seraph serpent was lifted up for the curing of the Israelites.

The Son of Man had to be lifted up, lifted up on the Cross. This was not the Pharisees’ show. The Passion was to be a very specific hour foreordained by Divine Providence. It is God’s world; His enemies are just living in it. Living in it, and against their own desires, fulfilling God’s will by perpetrating an event that is destined to spread merciful grace across the entire world.

Jesus was marching firmly toward His hour, acutely aware that His Father was completely in charge.

Do we do the same with our life’s crosses? Or do we lose hope and trust when they come? Or are we certain, as Jesus was, that they fall within the ambit of Divine Providence, and that He will never take us where He cannot protect us in His grace?

Lack of trust is a self-fulfilling prophecy, as is trust in God. When we do not trust, we truncate God’s ability to care for us, for He plays by His own rules in respecting our free choice to distance ourselves from Him with doubt; but when we do trust, we open the doors wide for Him to enter into our hearts with the gift of His salvation and sanctification.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to give you sufficient faith in His Divine love and Providence, to recognize His invitation to be purified and to help Him save through the crosses He allows into your life. Ask Him, not to reduce your suffering, but to grant you the same firm resolve of faithfulness to Him that He gave to Jesus.

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February 23, 2021February 8, 2021

On Target

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

One of the most powerful statements in the Old Testament, found in today’s reading, is not often quoted as such: “So shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me void, but shall do my will, achieving the end for which I sent it.”

God is not a pathetic god, sending futile groans and lamentations out into the ether, decrying all those things are not as He would like.

No, in spite of the evidence of the reign of sin, God Himself is absolute ruler, and evil only exists to the extent that God made space for freedom–including that ability for freedom to turn away from Him. Evil, as evil as it is, and as good as God is, fits into His good plan.

Thus, He is not a pathetic, sad, lamenting god in need of our help, but the absolute Lord of the universe.

This quote from the first reading tells us that when God intends something, it happens, pure and simple. He does not set a process in motion only to watch it run aimlessly and fruitlessly. The image used to illustrate this is a beautiful one. It is the image of the process that He Himself set in motion for nature: That water falls from the sky, and it serves its purpose on earth of irrigating and giving life perfectly before it returns to the sky. (It is as if the ancients understood the process of evaporation…)

So, when we are moved by the Holy Spirit, it is not in a whimsical or aimless way, but to accomplish that which He has determined is to be accomplished. That push of the Holy Spirit is not to return to God void, but is to achieve the end for which it was intended.

But in the end, what is it that God wills–that Jesus Christ, His eternal Word, has descended like rain to accomplish, before ascending again to the skies?

It just so happens that the answer jumps out at us from today’s gospel, where it is clearly written in black and white. “Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.” Jesus has come to save His chosen ones, those ready to use their freedom to follow Him. This is the coming of the Father’s Kingdom; this is the fulfillment of His will.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to make you, like Him, the effective instrument of the Father, the efficient catalyst of His glorious, eternal, saving plan for humanity. Ask Him to make you a word that does not return to Him void, but does His will, achieving the end for which He sent it.

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October 18, 2020September 25, 2020

Chess Master

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

In today’s second reading from the book of Thessalonians, Paul speaks of “endurance in hope.”

Perhaps we don’t always hope as we should.

The world, shattered as it is by the original rebellion of man against God, and the ongoing chaos cause by the sins of pride and sensuality, appears to be spiraling downards.

There is something that should give us, we may say, an extra dose of hope, of which we perhaps do not often think. On the one hand, for the core of our hope, it is well to remember that this life with all its chaos is passing, we are pilgrims, and that we will find true joy in our eternal home in Heaven. But there is another beautiful reality that should also support our hope.

That reality is that God is the Lord of history, and even though humanity is sometimes ruled by evil people, God Himself is arranging all circumstances, evil ones caused by those who are evil and good ones cause by Himself and those who are good, into precisely the right order to favor the salvation of as many persons as possible. And, in precisely the best order for our lives, in which we are called to imitate His Son Jesus Christ, to love in joy and sacrifice.

Cyrus, the leader of the Persians mentioned in the first reading, was a pagan. Although he did not know God, God called upon him to free the Israelites at the time when, in His wisdom, He wanted to bring their punishment of exile in Babylon to an end.

Cyrus did not know God. But still, he formed a key part of God’s plan, and God led him.

In the Gospel passage, Jesus teaches that we must obey civil authorities, even when they are godless, as long as they do not lead us into sin–paying taxes, for example. And indeed, the Lord of history ordained the rule of Caesar in Jerusalem at the time when the brutal Romans were a needed factor for the violent sacrifice of His Son.

Think also of Constantine, the Cyrus, if you will, of the Christian era. In the early fourth century, God intervened directly with him, a pagan emperor, when He ordained that the years of Christian martyrdom and persecution in the Roman Empire were to come to an end.

Jesus Christ is Universal King, King of the Universe, King of all that happens in time. He does give full and ample space to human freedom, and allows the terrible consequences of our free choice of sin. In the end, though, it is He–the omnipotent Chess Master, we may say–who arranges history for the eternal benefit of the Church and His faithful ones.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Think of the political realities and world events that most concern you. Consider where Christians are suffering, and where evil persons or principles rule. Ask Jesus if He has these circumstances well in hand. Ask Him why He allows evil in the world, from the perspective of eternal salvation. And ask Him, the Lord of history, for mercy upon our fallen world, to guide events to a happy outcome and above all, to the eternal salvation of as many as possible.

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