Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Laboring and Carrying our Burdens in the Strength of the Lord


Jesus says to us in today’s Gospel, Mt 11: 28-30, “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.”    In the first reading, Isaiah 40: 25-31, Isaiah reminds us that God “does not faint or grow weary” and that “his knowledge is beyond scrutiny.”  There is nothing about you or me  that God does not know.  He knows when you or I have grown weary. He knows when we feel faint and overwhelmed by what we are facing in our lives, in this very  hour.  He knows exactly where you and  I are on this journey to the Promised Land. He knows whether we are in “inclement weather,” buffeted by storms too much for us, whether  we are on a smooth path or a rough one, whether we have encountered an “enemy,” or are approaching a hostile or a friendly environment.  He also knows whether we are “armed” for the battle or ill-prepared.  “Why,” God asked, “do you even think that your “way is hidden” from me or that your rights are “disregarded” by  me? “Do you not know or have you not heard, Isaiah asks, that the Lord is the eternal God, creator of the ends of the earth, that God “does not faint nor grow weary,” that “his knowledge is beyond scrutiny,” that he “gives strength to the fainting; for the weak he makes vigor abound.”  Do you not know  that those who “hope in the Lord will renew their strength, they will soar as with eagles’ wings; they will run and not grow weary, walk and not grow faint.”  Yes, if we come to Jesus, in good times and in “bad”, we will know all these things!

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