Willed by God

In today's first reading, Colossians 1: 1-8, St. Paul identifies himself as "an Apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God."  By whose will are you who you are?  Did you consult God before choosing the career that you have chosen or before choosing your spouse or before making any decision, for that matter? Or do you act independently of God, as though you were your own being apart from God? Something to think about!

Jesus tells us in  John 5: 19-20, that He does nothing apart from His Father and that He was sent by the Father; that is, that He did not come of His own will but the Father's (cf. John 6: 57).  Neither you nor I, whether we realize it or not, are capable of doing good apart from God. And, yes, we also have been sent into the world by the will of our God. Perhaps one of the missions we have been given is to realize this truth and to act out of that truth: we are God's and it is God's will that we progress in becoming the person He intends us to become and to give the kinds of service He wants us to give.

We also dependent upon God for being freed of that which deprives us of being the person God intends us to be, as with Peter's mother-in-law who was in bed with a fever (see today's Gospel, Luke 4 38-44). Through members of her family, Jesus intervened,  rebuking the fever and it left her. She got up and ministered to her family. We have been sent here to serve others, as did Jesus, and to build up the Kingdom of our Beloved, of our God and King!

My prayer is that whatever "fever" holds us back from doing the will of God in our lives will be rebuked by Jesus, as was the fever that took hold of Peter's mother-in-law. And may the "fever" that cripples our government officials from doing good for others be rebuked by Jesus, also!

God's Providence

Today's first reading, Ex 2: 1-15a, tells the story of Moses' birth, his being placed in "a papyrus basket, daubed...with bitumen and pitch," and hidden in some reeds on the river bank. The baby was found at age three months by an Egyptian woman who recognized the boy as very special and belonging to an Israelite woman. He is rescued and eventually adopted by Pharaoh's daughter as her own son and given the name "Moses," meaning "I drew him out of the waters." When Moses grew up and saw an Egyptian fighting with one of his own kinsmen, he killed him. Fearing that Pharaoh found out about the murder, Moses fled to Midian.

The first stanza of today's Responsorial Psalm, Ps. 69, describes Moses' plight: "I am sunk in the abysmal swamp where there is no foothold; I have reached the watery depths; the flood overwhelms me."

You and I--in our sinfulness, in the weaknesses to which we give in when we lord it over others, when we  need to have things work out our way and we refuse to compromise, when we are obnoxious and prideful, when we do not follow the Spirit's lead--can also sink  into "the abysmal swamp where there is no foothold; [we can then reach] the watery depths; the flood [then can overwhelm us]."

With today's psalmist, I "pray to you, O Lord, for the time of your favor...In your great kindness answer me with your constant help....I will praise the name of God in song, and I will glorify him with thanksgiving...."

As we prayed yesterday at the liturgy,  "our help is in the name of the Lord" (Psalm 124).  With God at our sides, we will not sink into the "abysmal swamp where there is no foothold."