Memorial of Saint Alphonsus Liguouri, Bishop and Doctor
of the Church
Moses did exactly as the LORD had commanded him. Exodus
40:16
“The Kingdom of heaven is like a net thrown
into the sea, which collects fish of every kind. When it is full they haul it ashore and
sit down to put what is good into buckets. What is bad they throw away.” Matthew
13:47-48
Piety
Father, all your good gifts surround us. Yet, rather than using these for the sake of
others, we use them for our own comfort.
Jesus, lead us out of our comfort zone and into your discomfort zone of the
Cross. Holy Spirit, give us your gifts
so that we might do exactly as the Lord commands. Amen.
Study
Outside of Jesus, can anyone since Moses claim to do
exactly as the Lord had commanded? We
all fall away sometimes. But do we
return? If we know that heaven is the
final winnowing, will we change enough to be there in the dwelling place of the
Lord the end?
As the psalmist reminds us, even the sparrow and the
swallow – the smallest of birds -- find a nest for their young. Are we “renewing” ourselves to sleep on the
threshold of the Lord rather than in the “tents of the wicked.”
We seek not to be popular. Rather we seek to be authentic followers of
Christ. Sometimes, this might result in
popularity. However, that is not how we
will be judged in the end. The scale
will be if we are in the right kind of relationship with the Lord and our
fellow human beings. Such a relationship
is focused outside ourselves.
Witness Moses.
He was NOT concerned with building a comfortable house for himself. Rather, his focus was on making a proper
dwelling place for the Lord and leading others to the Promised Land.
Action
Today is a new month.
Happy August. Is there one action
you can take this month to take you out of your comfort zone? These summer months are the long stretch
between the holy seasons of Advent and Lent when we focus on alms-giving and
sacrifice. However, that does not mean
we can not make August our Little Advent.
Maybe you can drive less and use the money you save on
car expenses (gas, parking, insurance, etc.) to help others. Maybe you can give up one restaurant meal per
week to result in some savings.
Maybe now is the time to add a little exercise time and
resist renting another movie from Netflix, Amazon Prime or Hulu.
Each little step will give you something that you can
use to add to building a little more of the Kingdom every day.
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