God's Inheritance Is Never Abandoned

In today's first reading, Isaiah 10: 5-7, 13b-16, Assyria is a "rod in anger" and God's "staff in wrath". Through the prophet  Isaiah, God says: "Against an impious nation I send him, and against a people under my wrath I order him to seize plunder, carry off loot, and tread them down like the mud of the streets. But this is not what he [the empire of Assyria] intends, nor does he have this in mind: rather,  it is in his heart to destroy, to make an end of  nations not a few. For he says: 'By my own power I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I am shrewd. I have moved the boundaries of peoples, their treasures I have pillaged, and, like a giant, I have put down the enthroned. My hand has seized like a nest the riches of nations; as one takes eggs left alone, so I took in all the earth; no one fluttered a wing, or opened a mouth, or chirped!'"

God is furious at Assyria's claim and will to destroy other nations. Clearly, though, Assyria will suffer consequences for its fury toward other nations, including God's chosen people.  Did God use Assyria to chastise His people, to bring them back to the fold, to bring them to repentance? We can say "yes" in the sense that God uses the evil which any nation or any person encounters as a means to chastise us and bring us to repentance, to turn us from idolatrous ways. However, to those bringing harm and tragedy to another country or persons, in this case the empire of Assyria, God says the following, as noted in this passage from Isaiah: "Therefore the Lord, the Lord of hosts, will send among his fat ones leanness, and instead of  his glory there will be kindling like the kindling of fire."

In the responsorial psalm of today's liturgy, Psalm 94, we cry out on behalf of victims of violence:  "Your people, O Lord, they trample down, your inheritance they afflict. Widow and stranger they slay, the fatherless they murder. And they [those raging war and committing acts of violence] say, 'The Lord sees not; the God of Jacob perceives not.' Understand you senseless ones among the people; and, you fools, when will you be wise? Shall he who shaped the ear not hear or he who formed the eyes not see? Shall he who instructs nations not chastise, he who teaches men knowledge? For the Lord will not cast off his people, nor abandon his inheritance."

We are God's inheritance and, as such, we will be chastised when we do wrong but never abandoned. The psalmist reminds us  that God's "judgment shall...be with justice, and all the upright of heart shall follow it."

God as Builder and the One in Charge

In today's first reading, 2 Samuel 7: 4-17,  God reminds David of all that He has done for Him and specifically tells David that he does not need him to build him a house. "In all my wanderings everywhere among the children of Israel, did I ever utter a word to any one of the judges whom I charged to tend my people Israel, to ask: 'Why have you not built me a house of cedar?'"
Then, through Nathan, God reminds David, further, that God is the One in charge of his life, that He is the One who called him to shepherd the Israelites, that He is the One who has "been with you wherever you went, and I  have destroyed your enemies."  I am the One, God tells David, who "will make you famous like the great ones of the earth."  In other words, God is saying to David: You do not have to make a name for yourself by building Me, your God, a Temple.

Neither do you and I need to make a name for ourselves. God is doing that for us. God brought us into His Body, the Church, in Baptism.  God has given us an inheritance, His eternal Kingdom, through the blood of the Cross.  God feeds us  with the best of wheat in Holy Communion,  the Body and Blood of His Son Jesus Christ, by whom our redemption continues. For those who live justly, love tenderly, walk humbly with God (cf Micah 6:8),  repent and believe in the Gospel, the Kingdom of heaven awaits them on the last day.

God's Inheritance

In today’s first reading, 1 Cor. 1: 25-31, St. Paul reminds us that we “are in Christ Jesus” and that Jesus, through a gift from God the Father, became for us “wisdom,…righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.”  Those of us chosen, called to become Jesus’ disciples, to live “in Christ Jesus,”  St. Paul reminds us, were not “powerful.” We were not “of noble birth.” No! God “chose the foolish of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to shame the strong, and God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those  who are something, so that no human being might boast before God. [In fact, it] is due to [God] that you [and I] are in Christ Jesus.”

How difficult it may be to absorb the truth that before being  and living “in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from  God, as well as righteousness, sanctification, and redemption,” you and I were  weak, foolish,   lowly and the despised of the world, counting for nothing and that there is nothing you and I can boast about, nothing!   Then turn this around and realize that Christ Jesus is your strength and mine, your wisdom and mine, your righteousness and mine, your sanctification and mine, your redemption and mine.   Furthermore, the author of Psalm 33, today’s responsorial psalm , tells us that God has “chosen [us] for his own inheritance.” God’s inheritance! What? You and I are “God’s inheritance”?  WOW!

God as Our Inheritance

The response to today’s responsorial psalm is “You are my inheritance, O Lord.”  Today we celebrate the feast of St. Clare of Assisi, who comes from a very wealthy Assisian family.  Her inheritance would have been huge.  She left it all, escaping the family dwelling at night to join St. Francis of Assisi to live a life of poverty.  She says to the Lord: “You are my inheritance, O Lord,” not the wealth of my family.  You are all I need in life, not earthly riches, not a life of luxury, not expensive pearls or other attractive jewelry and expensive clothing. You are enough for me. I need nothing else in this life but you.

How many families and/or marriages are stressed out over the inheritance being left them by their wealthy families.  How many wealthy families fight over their wealth.  Not Clare. God was all she wanted and needed. She left everything, even the wealthy suitor her parents secured for her marriage.”My Lord and My God, you are enough for me.” And she lived her entire life of consecrated poverty that way.

Those who have discovered the wealth of dependence upon God above all are truly wealthy, whether married, single or being members of a religious congregation!  Those who trust in God above all are truly secure.  Nothing on this earth can provide the security of our Lord and God! The Lord says to you and to me:   “Trust in Me and you shall be saved. Serve Me above all in your neighbor and you will know true joy.  Seek  Me above all and you will know a  peace the world cannot give you. Truly,” God says to us, "I am enough for you.”  Jesus, the Son of God,  says to us  in Matthew 6: 25-27: “…Do not worry about your life, what you will eat [or drink], or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not more important [ to Me] than they? “

 St. Clare knew that and lived that! What about you and me?

God's Compassion and Mercy

In today’s first reading, Micah 7: 14-15, 18-20, the prophet Micah prays to God as follows: 

Shepherd your people with your staff, the flock of your inheritance.…, as in the days when you came from the land of Egypt, show us wonderful signs. Who is there like you, the God who removes guilt and pardons sin for the remnant of his inheritance; who does not persist in anger forever, but delights rather in clemency, and will again have compassion on us, treading underfoot our guilt? You will cast into the depths of the sea all our sins; You will show faithfulness to Jacob,[Leah and Rachel], and grace to Abraham[and Sarah], as you have sworn to our fathers/[mothers] from days of old.

That message is given to us today as well as to the people of old.  We are “the flock” of God’s “inheritance.”  The land of Egypt symbolizes the places and times when we, like the Israelites, were/are victims of, or perpetrators of, sin:   selfishness, abuse of power and control, the sins of oppression and injustice, the exploitation of the poor and oppressed, persons engaging in deceitful behaviors and so on.  In today’s world slavery abounds, as it did in Egypt when God rescued His people. Today’s slavery includes  slave labor, making children and women slaves of the sex industry, of  drug trafficking, of those abusing their power, and so on.

Micah reminds us that when we lower ourselves to evil schemes and sin against others and against ourselves,  God “will again have compassion on us, treading underfoot our guilt.”  God does not condone our sinful behaviors but He does pardon us, has compassion on us, and, yes, “cast into the depths of the sea all of sins.”  This does not mean that we will not suffer the consequences of our sinful, selfish actions whereby the rights of others are trampled upon.  It does mean that, when we turn to God in repentance, God is merciful and forgiving!

With the psalmist in today’s responsorial psalm, Psalm 85,  we pray: “Restore us, O God our savior, and abandon your displeasure against us….Show us, O Lord, your kindness, and grant us your salvation.”

God as King

Yesterday we celebrated the feast of Christ, our King.  This morning in prayer I imagined the following conversation with the Lord. It went like this:

 

I am King.

You are a King’s daughter.

You are royalty!

You are the recipient of my inheritance,

eternal  life in my Kingdom.

I secured that inheritance for you

by my obedience as Son of Man to My Father’s will

—your salvation and the salvation of the whole world.

When I was nailed to a cross,

when I crushed the head of Satan,

all nations, all kingdoms of the earth, all languages (cf. Daniel 7: 13-14)

were brought under My rule and reconciled to My Father.

As Daniel prophesied, “all peoples, all nations and languages

serve [God].

[M]y dominion is an everlasting dominion

that shall not be taken away.” 

[M]y kingdom shall not be destroyed” (Daniel 7: 13-14)

Look, Lord, at the world!

The world as you know it is passing away!

God shall reign forever. 

God reigns now and has reigned before this world ever came into existence

and will reign eternally.