In today's readings, Romans 6: 12-18 and Luke 12: 39-48, we are presented with the challenge to make choices: 1) between sin and grace and/or 2) being prepared or unprepared for when the Lord comes to show us the way He wants us to go or when He comes to terminate our time here on earth. Regarding sin, St. Paul says to us in Romans 6: 12-18, "...sin is not to have any power over you, since you are not under the law but under grace." The law, Paul tells us in another passage, condemns us. Grace, on the other hand, frees us from slavery to laws! Grace is love and love is freedom to follow Christ. What choices am I making? Am I choosing grace, that is, do I follow the Spirit's lead throughout the day, doing good and rejecting evil, being detached to go with the flow of grace or attached and unprepared to follow the will of God as revealed to me throughout the day?
In the Gospel, Luke challenges us to be prepared for the Lord when He comes to terminate our time here on earth--to be as prepared as we would be for a break in of a thief! We would not wait until it is too late and the thief has robbed us of our significant possessions, including the money we would need to take care of our families, and/or, worst still, kill us and our family members to steal from us without any opposition. "Be sure of this: if the master of the house had known the hour when the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. You also must be prepared, for an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come."
How often, on the nightly news, have we not heard a person say of a dying family member: "I wish he/she would have gotten vaccinated." Or the dying person him/herself expresses regret of not protecting him/herself. It is then too late1 "The "thief" has broken in and the person/s were unprepared!
How am I preparing myself for the unexpected? How am I preparing myself or my family members for the day the Lord comes to take us to Paradise?
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