How Sweet to My Taste Is Your Promise!

How Sweet to My Taste Is Your Promise!

November 23, 2012

Friday of the Thirty-third Week in Ordinary Time

By Melanie Rigney

I took the small scroll from the angel’s hand and swallowed it. In my mouth it was like sweet honey, but when I had eaten it, my stomach turned sour. (Revelation 10:10)

How sweet to my taste is your promise! (Psalms 119:103)

Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, saying to them, “It is written, My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.” (Luke 19:45-46)

Piety

Lord, be with me in the sorrows of the day and those ahead, those I create for myself and those that are inflicted upon me by others. Let me always hold that sweet taste of Your honey in my mouth and my soul.

Study

The New American Bible notes on this chapter of Revelation tell us that the taste of the scroll was sweet because of its message of “the final victory of God’s people,” and that its sourness was due to the news of the sufferings we would endure.

Now, a day after Thanksgiving, our immediate sufferings may consist of bloating, a slight headache from over-imbibing, regret over a dinner argument or two, or maybe for those who already started Christmas shopping, misgivings over gift spending. And for the most part, those are transitory.

Other suffering passes less easily, if at all. We may harden our hearts when God doesn’t answer prayers for healing of ourselves or loved ones in the way we desire. People die. People get horrendous diseases and experience pain that seems intolerable. We try to do what we can to help the poor and the needy, and despair when their plight continues seemingly unabated despite our efforts. We try as we can to change a difficult job situation, but our efforts don’t work and we can’t even get an interview for a new position. Someone we hold precious is unable to come to terms with an addiction.

And while everyone around us is singing Christmas carols and talking about the joyful anticipation that will come soon with the season of Advent, it can be mighty hard to remember that somewhere in that scroll, there was a sense of sweetness of hope and a guarantee of salvation.

But it’s there. It’s always been there, even in the bitterest of times when we find it hardest to love and to believe anyone, let alone God, can love us. And perhaps that’s part of what Advent’s about… not only waiting, but finding that one sweet spot we can hold onto, whether it’s a Scripture reading, a homily, a friend’s smile, or the sight of a happy newborn, tender and mild. Don’t be afraid to take a taste.

Action

Take note today of the places in your life in which the sour lingers in your mouth. What can you do to rinse it out?