God's Faithfulness in our Fickleness

In today’s first reading, 2 Chronicles 24: 17-25,  we learn of King Joash’s abandonment of Yahweh’s covenant with the Chosen People.  He led the Chosen People in forsaking the temple of the Lord and in beginning to serve idols.  Because of their crimes, wrath came upon Judah and Jerusalem.  Through Zachariah, the prophet, God confronted Joash, asking him: “Why are you transgressing the Lord’s commands, so that you cannot prosper? Because you have abandoned the Lord, he has abandoned you.”   

The cycle of sin and redemption repeats itself over and over again with the Chosen People and with us.  We choose to go our own way at times, abandoning the ways of God. Sin always leads to suffering of some kind. When things get bad enough, we beg God for help: save us, O God, from the misery  that surrounds and invades us, even into our very being as we feel depressed, empty and lost. That plea for help may seem to fall on deaf ears; silence can become oppressive.  In sincerely repenting, God shows his mercy and love for His wayward children. No matter how far we might have strayed, God brings us back to righteousness and right ways.  For a time, we remain faithful and then fall again.

O,  the mercy and the love of God, who,  in today’s responsorial psalm, says to us: “Forever I will maintain my love for [you,]  my servant….Forever I will maintain my kindness toward…[you]….my mercy I will not take from…[you], nor will I belie my faithfulness” (Psalm 89).