“Build My House” by Beth DeCristofaro

Thursday of the Twenty-fifth Week in Ordinary Time

Thus says the Lord of hosts:  Consider your ways!  Go up into the hill country; bring timber and build the house that I may take pleasure in it and receive my glory, says the Lord. (Haggai 1:7-8)

Herod said, “John I beheaded.  Who then is this about whom I hear such things?” And he kept trying to see (Jesus). (Luke 9:9)

Piety

Help me Lord to reflect on you and my own experience.  Help me to see the ways in which I share your glory with the world and help me spend my time and energy there.  Help me also see when I “try” without heart and bring me back to your path of life.

Study

People who “keep trying to see you” but only when it is convenient for them are frustrating.  Someone who “keeps trying to see you” then never follows through or cancels plans causes hurt. People who “keep trying to see you” when they need something such as a job reference or a networking lunch can drain you.  And those, like Pilot “who kept trying to see” Jesus but never actually tried and wondered only where he fit into the picture are hypocrites.  None of these people are friends.  Nicodemus, Peter, Matthew, Mary Magdalen, and others all saw him.  They didn’t just “keep trying.” 

As they followed him, Jesus’ friends built within and among themselves a house to show his glory.  This takes as great an effort as going to the hills, felling trees and planning timber then carrying it back to construct a temple.  Building a place for God’s glory calls for perseverance.  We might be tempted to blow with the winds of the easiest path like the seeds which the sower dropped on the rocky ground.  Or we find ourselves choked out like the other seeds at the first challenge to our Christian identity.  When Herod finally met Jesus, he neither saw nor heard him.  He heard only the winds of power and threat.  He acted for himself not for God’s, certainly not Jesus’ glory.  

Action

As St. Paul tells us, we are Temples of the Holy Spirit, “purchased at a price” and we belong to God.  Do we exult God within our own bodies, giving human face and deeds to God’s glory?