“HONEY FROM THE ROCK”
Daily Reflections
Friday, 25th August 2017,
Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time
Rut 1: 1, 3-6, 14-16, 22;
Ps 146: 5-10 (R) 1;
Mt 22: 34-40
LOVING GOD WITH ALL OUR BEING
The Gospel of today invites us to reflect on the fundamental principle on which the life of every disciple of Christ is founded: Love of God and Love of neighbor. What does it mean to love God and to love neighbor? First and foremost, love of God is to experience God’s love for us. We are weak and vulnerable; we cannot love God as we should. But in Jesus we can experience that God loves us. Therefore, experiencing the love of God, in spite of one’s lowliness will make one to love God in return. This is the beginning of loving God. When a child experiences the love of the mother, it will never do anything against the mother. This is the meaning of loving God. When we experience God’s love we will not do anything against God, we will not fall into sin, rather we will do all that pleases him.
It pleases God when we love one another. Therefore, while loving God one begins to love one another. In what way can my love towards my neighbor become perfect? When we love our neighbors we desire that they always be partakers in God’s eternal life. We wish and pray for them that they may live all the days of their life in grace. Thus they become the partakers of eternal life given to us gratuitously by Jesus. When we love our neighbor in this manner we do not undermine their physical and other needs. We remember what Jesus said ‘what you do to the least of the brethren, you do it unto him.’ We reach out to people who are in need in the ways possible to us. This is our love for our neighbor.
Scripture says, we are to love “with our heart, with our soul, and with our mind.” In other words, with our whole being. Do you love God with your whole being? With every part of who you are? We can do so when we entrust our lives to God. Our all-powerful and all-loving God must be trusted to an unlimited extent. Entrustment of ourselves will set our hearts on fire! This means that we will see the Holy Spirit do amazing things within our souls. We will see God acting and transforming us. The effect of a blazing fire of the Holy Spirit within us is that God will do great things in the lives of those around us through us. We will witness God at work and be amazed at what He does. We will witness first hand His amazing power and transforming love and it will happen through us. Do you love God with every part of who you are? Commit yourself completely to serving our Lord and His holy will
Prayer: Lord, help me to love You with my whole heart, mind, soul and strength. Help me to love You with my whole being. In that love, I pray You transform me into Your instrument of grace. Jesus, I trust in You. Amen.
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