“Deliver Them” by Rev. Paul Berghout (@FatherPB)
Piety
Even when the LORD raised up judges to deliver them from the power of their despoilers, they did not listen to their judges but abandoned themselves to the worship of other gods. They were quick to stray from the way their fathers had taken and did not follow their example of obedience to the commandments of the LORD.
Judges 2:16-17
Jesus said to him, "If you wish to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me." When the young man heard this statement, he went away sad, for he had many possessions. Matthew 19:21-22
Study
There once was a man who fell into a pit and couldn’t get himself out.
A PHARISEE said: "Only BAD people fall into a pit."
A MATHEMATICIAN calculated HOW he fell into the pit.
BUDDHA said: "Your pit is only a state of mind."
A GEOLOGIST told him to appreciate the rock strata in the pit.
An OPTIMIST said: "Things COULD be worse."
A PESSIMIST said: "Things WILL get worse!!"
JESUS, seeing the man, took him by the hand and LIFTED HIM OUT of the
pit.
The moral of the story—This life is a time of mercy. DON’T JUDGE OTHERS
WITH A CRITICAL SPIRIT OR IN SELF RIGHTEOUSNESS.
In Sunday’s first reading, Jeremiah was thrown into a pit as a
consequence of his prophetic ministry. His
rope of hope was the same one that’s available for us: The Bible.
Sacred scriptures provide inspiration and instruction to get us out of
any pit into which we fall. Today, in our First Reading, despite the warning
from the Judges, the people keep falling back into their old ways of
worshipping Baal. We read of how Israel
worshiped other gods and fell into the pit known as the power of their enemies.
Psalm 34:19 says, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the
LORD delivers him out of them all.”
King David said in Psalm 40:2, "God lifted me out of the pit and
set my feet upon a rock. Praise also brings you out of the pit. God is looking
for some pit-praisers, people who praise Him no matter what happens.
In Michelangelo’s Last Judgement in the Sistine Chapel, looking closely
at the detail we can see two souls being hauled up to heaven by what looks like
a rope. However, on closer inspection, we can see it is the Rosary. The Rosary
has the power to lift us up to God. The Rosary works as a chain that pulls down
to earth the graces that we need to live the Christian life. In times of
tribulation, the Rosary has the power to lift us up over our difficulties
because Mary, Our Mother, intercedes for us. The Rosary is a prayer of
intercession.
When Jeremiah hit the bottom of the pit, he sank into the mud.
Action
The Road Less Traveled begins with the insight of “Life is Difficult.”
The author admits that although this is not a very profound statement, it is
very profound when we accept the fact that life is difficult because then, all
of a sudden, it is not so difficult.
For us, even if you think that by the illness of sin you have already
hit rock bottom: Be careful, there is mud at the bottom; there are trap doors.
By God’s grace, a transformed self-consciousness says, “No, I don’t have to
live like this!” That is the only way
out of a self-made pit.
Even then, the devil would love to drag you down again, even further.
After all, Scripture tells us that Hell is described as a ‘bottomless pit’ of
eternal damnation, and that until Satan is thrown into that pit forever, he has
freedom of movement and he wants to drag us there too.
He’s throwing a fit on the way to the pit!
Pit or not, God is looking for Compassionate People. In Sunday’s First Reading, a Cushite (from
Africa) saved Jeremiah from the pit.
Some people don’t care if others are at the bottom of the pit. They
will just say: “Who cares?” Or, “I have my own life and my own problems to care
about.”
The Cushite took some old rags and worn-out garments and used them to
save Jeremiah and bring him out of the pit. Use whatever you have and the Lord
will bless you in order to save souls.
We are not alone. Jesus was also
thrown into “the pit” beneath the house of Caiaphas, where Caiaphas imprisoned Jesus
the night before his crucifixion. Jesus plunges himself into the depths of our
alienation so that we might rise. Event he rich young man is trapped in the
pit of his possessions. Although he goes
away sad, we know that Jesus can still save him.
In the Gospel, Jesus speaks about the baptism of death. We spend our
lives undergoing little baptisms, emerging from our pits. Jeremiah was left for
dead but rose with help. Jesus died and
rose from the dead.
We can die and rise, but we do not do this alone. In Sunday’s Responsorial
Psalm from Psalm 40, the second stanza says, “He drew me out of the pit of
destruction, out of the mud of the swamp; he made firm my steps.”
Concluding illustration: "This guy's walking down the street when
he falls in a hole. The walls are so steep he can't get out.
"A doctor passes by and the guy shouts up, 'Hey you. Can you help
me out?' The doctor writes a prescription, throws it down in the hole and moves
on.
"Then a priest comes along and the guy shouts up, 'Father, I'm
down in this hole can you help me out?' The priest writes out a prayer, throws
it down in the hole and moves on
"Then a friend walks by, 'Hey, Joe, it's me can you help me out?'
And the friend jumps in the hole. Our guy says, 'Are you stupid? Now we're both
down here.' The friend says, 'Yeah, but I've been down here before and I know
the way out.'"
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