In today's first reading, Deuteronomy 4: 32-40, God asks Moses: "Did anything so great ever happen before? Was it ever heard of? Did a people ever hear the voice of God speaking from the midst of fire, as you did, and live? Or did any god venture to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by testings, by signs and wonders, by war, with his strong hand and outstretched arm, and by great terrors, all of which the Lord, your God, did for you in Egypt before your very eyes. All of this you were allowed to see that you might know the Lord is God and there is no other."
God, undoubtedly, did great things for the people of Israel, the people of the Old Covenant! Why? So that they would "might know the Lord is God and there is no other." He has also done great things for the people of the New Covenant, for you and I, so that we, too, "might know the Lord is God and there is no other!" What are those things? Conceiving Mary without sin. Sending the second person of the Blessed Trinity to take on human nature in Mary's womb, Mary, who was chosen to be the mother of God Incarnate. Showing us, through Jesus, the way to the Father, the way to live holy lives, ways to grow in holiness and grace! Showing us, through Jesus, how to deal with the effects of sin: conflicts, rejections, persecutions, condemnation, "crucifixions," death itself! As people looked upon Jesus on the cross and witnessed His death, they said: Truly, He is the Son of God!" In that moment the people knew that "the Lord is God and there is no other."
That we "might know the Lord is God and there is no other," we, too, experience what the Israelites experienced: God rescuing us "by his strong hand and outstretched arm." By "testings, signs and wonders, by war," within ourselves, our families, nations, religions, cultures, races, and so on,
we come to believe that "the Lord is God and there is no other." Only with God's help, with God being our warrior, do we overcome the hatred, the prejudice and the resentments that lead us, individually, nationally and internationally to commit violence acts against others.
In what ways have you, have I, "heard the voice of God speaking from the midst of fire"; or what "testings,...signs and wonders,...great terrors" did God do for you or me that we "might know the Lord is God and there is no other"?
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