Jesus Made Sin for Us to Save Us from Sin

In today's responsorial psalm, Psalm 51, we pray:  Have mercy on me, O God, in your goodness; in the greatness of your compassion wipe out my offense. Thoroughly wash me from my  guilt and of my sin cleanse me.... A clean heart create for me, O God, and a steadfast spirit renew within me.....Give me back the joy of your salvation...O Lord, open my lips, and my  mouth shall proclaim your praise."

God did that for you and me on Calvary. St. Paul tells us in today's second reading, 2 Cor 5: 20-6: 2, that God, for "our sake made [Jesus] to be sin who did not know sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him."  Think of the most heinous of crimes. Those were put on Jesus. He became sin itself in all its ugliness, repulsion and heinousness: the sins of hatred and murder, the sins of deceitfulness, cheating, and corruption; the sins of lust and gluttony, of envy and jealousy, of sloth and avarice, of pride and covetousness, of indifference, disobedience, and disdain and any other sinful act of which you and I are unaware.   As sin, Jesus was crucified, proclaimed a sinner and put to death as a criminal.  He took upon himself the sins of the entire world and everyone in this world and set us free.  "[I]n the greatness of [God's] compassion, [God wiped] out our offenses, [t]horoughly [washed us] from [our] guilt and of [our sins cleansed us]. A clean heart [God created] for [us. He gave us] back the joy of [His] salvation!"  And for that reason, our "lips and [our mouths] shall proclaim [God's] praises."  We Catholics do so especially in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass when, in memory of Jesus and with all of the angels and saints in heaven, we offer Jesus' body and blood--the consecrated bread and wine--to God in atonement for our sins and the sins of the entire world.

In our prayers and fasting, this Lent, O Lord, we bring our sins and the sins of the entire world to you and beg your forgiveness, your mercy and compassion.  Be merciful to us sinners and restore us to your friendship this day and every day of our lives. And may we, in turn, be merciful, compassionate and understanding of one another, taking time to reconcile with each other, as You reconciled us to the Father.

The Coming of the Lord

In today's first reading, Revelation 22: 1-7, St. John is shown "the river of life-giving weave, sparkling like crustal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb [Jesus Christ, our Risen Savior] down the middle of the street. On either side of the river grew the three of life....; the leaves of the trees serve as medicine for the nations. Nothing accursed will be found anymore....Night will be no more, nor will [we] need light from lamp or sun, for the word God shall give [us] light, and [we] ball reign forever and ever....Behold I am coming soon [to take us to this Kingdom that last forever and in which "nothing accursed shall be found]."

Imagine! Nothing accursed shall be found in the everlasting Kingdom nor in you or me or anyone else allowed to enter that Kingdom!  The gates to that Kingdom were opened for us by Jesus' life, death and resurrection. The blood of the Lamb has purified us white as freshly fallen snow!  Our sins are as far from God's mind as East from West.  They are remembered no more, as we learn from Jesus' response to the good thief on the cross when he asked Jesus to remember him when He entered His Kingdom. Jesus' response:  "This very day you will be with me in Paradise."  Jesus says the very same thing to you and me when we turn to Him and ask to be remembered!

May you and I be ready when our last day on earth arrives, be that today, tomorrow or years to come! God eagerly awaits that day!

Delivered from the Power of Darkness

In today's first reading, Colossians 1: 9-14, St.Paul prays for his disciples, asking God that they be "filled with the knowledge of God's will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, so as to be fully pleasing, in every good work bearing fruit and growing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with every power, in accord with his glorious might, for all endurance and patience, with joy giving thanks to the Father, who has made you fit to share in the inheritance of the holy ones in light." That is why Jesus has come to this earth and why, to this very day, lives among us and within us.  The prayer of St. Paul is fulfilled in each one of us because God has "delivered us from the power of darkness and transferred us to the Kingdom of his beloved 
Son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins."  When did and does God do this? at our baptisms, our confirmations, when we receive the sacraments of Reconciliation and Holy Communion,  and every time we carry out the good God inspires us to do. God also does this for us every time, like Peter in today's Gospel, Luke 5: 1-11, we listen to God's instructions when everything within us says: "That is not going to work, Lord," and we do it anyway for a "large, miraculous catch!"

Christ, our Mediator at the Father's Right Hand

In today’s first reading, Hebrews 9: 15, 24-28, St. Paul speaks about Christ, the “mediator of a new covenant.”  Jesus, once and for all, shed His blood for the remission of sin. In Paul’s words:   “… now once for all he has appeared at the end of the ages to take away sin by his sacrifice.”    On the cross, Jesus was made sin for us.   He sacrificed His life in obedience to the Father to fully atone for the sin of disobedience of our first parents, Adam and Eve, and subsequently by all of us. We have all sinned. And we all are redeemed by the blood of Christ, the unblemished Lamb of God.

Following His death , Jesus entered the sanctuary, not made by human hands like the sanctuary where the blood of unblemished animals were sacrificed over and over again, but the sanctuary of heaven. There at God’s right hand, Jesus intercedes for us day and night, 365 days a year.  “ Just as it is appointed that human beings die once, and after this the judgment, so also Christ offered once to take away the sins of many, will appear a second  time, not to take away sin but to bring salvation to those who eagerly await him.”  Though we do not know the time of Jesus’ second coming, we wait upon the Lord with courage.

The Lord will not disappoint! The Lord keeps His promises forever unlike no other!  And, so, in the liturgy’s responsorial psalm, Psalm 98, we “[s]ing to the Lord a new song, for He has done wondrous deeds; His right hand has won victory for Him, His holy arm. The Lord has made His salvation known: in the sight of the nations He has revealed His justice, He has remembered His kindness and His faithfulness toward the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation by our God. Sing joyfully to the Lord, all you lands, break into song; sing praise.”

God's Possession and What It Means

In today’s first reading, Ephesians 1: 11-14, Paul again reminds us that we are God’s possession, “chosen, destined in accord with the purpose of the One who accomplishes all things according to the intention of his will, so that we might exist for the praise of his glory….[I]n  Christ],…[we] were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,…the first installment of our inheritance toward redemption [and sanctification] as God’s possession.”

Wow!  The impact of Paul’s message is even more powerful when we insert our names in this passage: Dorothy Ann (your name), you are chosen! Why me? Why you?  Because you and  I are sinners  in need of redemption and sanctification.  And chosen for what? To realize our destiny as designed by God, who “accomplishes all things according to the intention of his will.”  We may question whether or not we are truly accomplishing “all things according to the intention of God’s will. However, that is God’s promise to us and God does not break His promises.  When we fail to follow the Spirit’s lead, God uses those circumstances to reconcile us to God, to make right our wrongs, so to speak.  God’s intention is that, “sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, …the first installment” of our “inheritance toward redemption as God’s possession,  that we lead lives that give “ praise of [God’s glory]!”—that we are glorifying our God by how we live the Gospel.

God’s gift of being chosen comes with a price: the death of His only begotten Son. God  sent His only begotten Son to pay the ransom for our sins. For our sake, Jesus bore the curse of sin, dying  a horrible death on the cross to reconcile us to the Father. Jesus gave His life that you and I, all of us,  might fully realize the gift of redemption and sanctification here on earth by the way we follow the Lord as  faithful disciples.

Am I, are you, on a daily basis, making choices that glorify our God: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit? God Almighty? God, who, in the words of St. Francis of Assisi, is all good, totally good? Do I, do you,  reflect God’s goodness in our attitudes, in our actions each day?  If not, why not? If not, how am I, are you,  betraying God's trust?

Claiming our Royalty at the Foot of the Cross

One of the meditations I reflected upon today stated “The world is under the bondage  of sin and evil” (Jesus Calling by Sarah Young, p. 153).  In today’s first reading, 1 Peter 2: 2-5, 9-12, St. Peter says    “you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of [God’s] own, so that you may announce the praises s of [God] who called you out of darkness into [God’s] wonderful light.” One statement describes why we needed redemption and the other the effect of redemption!   O, the greatness, the generosity and the mercy of our God, as described by Peter: “Once you were no people  but now you are God’s people; you had not received mercy  but now you have received mercy.”

Being God’s people, Peter invites us to “long for pure spiritual milk so that through it [we] may grow into salvation…”  May we grow into the salvation that is ours: being “a chosen race, a royal priesthood,  a holy nation, a people of {God’s] own.”  Yes, we will, in fact,  grow “out of darkness into {God’s] wonderful light.”  We might not realize that God is always at work in the world, transforming its darkness into light, its sinfulness and evil into holiness  and goodness anymore than persons watching the crucifixion of Jesus on the cross realized that the world was being freed from its bondage to sin and evil or that the Crucified Jesus truly was the One sent by God to save us, not condemn us.

 As we listen to the news every night and are fed “food” poisoned by ways in which people are “under the bondage of sin and evil” may we thirst and hunger more and more for God’s righteousness, for “pure spiritual milk” that St. Peter talks about in today’s first reading!  May we also, at times when we are faced with this world’s sinfulness, recall Jesus’ words: “Be not afraid. I have conquered the world.”  Jesus, who resides within us, will conquer the world of evil that we face and or experience within or with-out ourselves.

This is my belief! What is yours?

God Dwells among Us

In today's first reading, 1 Kings 8:22-23, 27-30, Solomon is amazed that God, the Creator of the Universe, has entered the Temple. How, he wonders, does God, whom the highest heaven cannot contain, dwell in a temple built by humans. More than that, however, God becomes a human person Himself. He takes on human flesh as the Son of Man, God Incarnate. He becomes one of us and experiences everything about being human, except sin. He is acquainted with sadness and sorrow, rejection and acceptance, joy and gratitude. Because he became human, he knows firsthand what it is like to be treated rudely, arrogantly, abusively, to be spoken to disrespectfully,to be looked down upon with disdain. His feelings have been bruised by sarcasm and ridicule. He's been abandoned, left to die--yes, he has been the man left for dead on the roadside, having been beaten and robbed. He is our homeless and immigrant population, the so-called alien person that people want deported, cast out of their countries, their towns and cities, their parishes and their homes. How can it be so? That is God's love for humanity, a love that is infinite.He is elated when we experience the best of what it means to be human. He grieves when we experience the worst of what it means to be human, when we allow sin in us to have the upper hand over grace. For that reason He became human, died and rose from the dead that we, too, will rise from all that creates death in ourselves and in others. What a great God we have, one like us in all things but sin so that we, too, can become the very holiness of God and realize the best version of ourselves.

Redeemed, Restored, Resurrected to Glory

In today’s first reading,  Ezra 9: 5-9, the prophet is bowed down in grief as he considers the ways in which the Chosen People have sinned against the Lord, our God.  “From the time of our fathers even to this day great has been our guilt, and for our wicked deeds we have been delivered up, we and our kings and our priests, to the will of the kings of foreign lands, to the sword, to captivity, to pillage, and to disgrace, as is the case today.”   How true all of this is in our day as well. Our country, our families, our society, our church and the world at largehave been delivered up to sin, to the slavery of selfishness, to the lust for power,  control, for pleasures of all sorts at other people’s expense.  Our lands are pillaged by earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, fires, tornadoes, tsunamis.  The lives of our children are ruined by human traffickers, drug traffickers, perpetrators of domestic violence and wars within and between nations, violators of human rights, especially those of the poor and even those of the unborn.  We are brought low on all sides.   

Ezra, not only acknowledges his peoples’ sins but also recognizes God’s incredible mercy, saying:  “And now, but a short time ago, mercy came to us from the Lord, our God, who left us a remnant and gave us a stake in his holy place; thus our God has brightened our eyes and given us relief in our servitude.” Do you and I  realize that, in our day, Jesus has given us “a stake in his holy place,” by His death and resurrection, by the Eucharist and the Word of God in our midst, by each of the sacraments that restore us to right relationships with each other, with our deepest self--our God-self-- and with the world around us? By God’s mercy, you and I are being transformed every day into vessels of His grace and mercy as we carry the Good News and are “Good News” people to those we encounter! Oh, may that be so in an abundance today, as God blesses our efforts to experience our redemption and relate as the redeemed!

The Rythm of Falling and Rising

In today’s first reading, 2 Cor 11:1-11, Paul states that he “betrothed…[the Corinthians] to one husband to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. But, [he says,] I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts may be corrupted from a sincere and pure commitment to Christ.” 

In my meditation this morning I was bemoaning my infidelity to the Lord in small things: not being totally honest, giving in to gossip from time to time or at times exaggerating a point to make a point,  to be noticed or presumably to be accepted; giving in to pride or whatever. 

The Lord then let me know who He is in my life. “Dorothy Ann, I, not Paul betrothed you as a chaste virgin to Christ. I am not afraid, as Paul was, that Satan, the Father of Lies, the Great Deceiver, will corrupt you.  I am your Redeemer. I live in you to protect you from Satan’s deceitful ways.  Will you fall from time to time? Yes! That is sin in you.  Will you rise after a fall? Yes! That is grace in you.  Your honesty with me in prayer is a grace that purifies you every time you come to me in prayer, in the Eucharist and in the sacrament of reconciliation.”

Who is God for you?  What do you do when you are discouraged after a fall?

Ransomed by the Blood of Christ

In today’s first reading, 1 Peter 1: 18-25, Peter says  to us: “Realize that you were ransomed from futile conduct, handed on by your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold but with the precious Blood of Christ as of a spotless unblemished Lamb.”   I imagined Jesus saying to you:

                “______(Your name)________, you are being ransomed today from the futility of

                complaining about others or about situations over which you have no control. I am

                ransoming you today from the slavery of sin, any sin, all sin.  I paid your ransom today

                as I offered my body and blood to God the Father in today’s liturgy, when I reminded

                the Father of the price I paid for you on Calvary, where I was tortured, crucified, taunted,

                pierced, ridiculed, mocked, spit upon, kicked, humiliated in all sorts of ways.

                “I was patient so you would learn patience.

                I was humble so you would learn humility.

                I was forgiving so you would learn to forgive.

                I was silent so you would learn the wisdom of silence in certain situations.

I surrendered to that over which I had no control so you would learn the value of surrender at appropriate times.

I spoke up where appropriate so you would learn the value of speaking your truth.”

Truly, God is a God of our salvation!