"Listen for the voice of the Holy Spirit" By Beth DeCristofaro
While they were worshiping the Lord and
fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work
to which I have called them. Then, completing their fasting and prayer, they laid hands on them and sent
them off. (Acts 13:2-3)
(Jesus said) “You have heard that it was
said to your ancestors, You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to
judgment. But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to
judgment, and whoever says to his brother, Raqa, will be answerable to the
Sanhedrin, and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liable to fiery Gehenna.
(Matthew 5:21-22)
Piety
O God, we are one with you. You have made us
one with you.
You have taught us that if we are open to one another, you dwell in us.
Help us to preserve this openness and to fight for it with all our hearts.
You have taught us that if we are open to one another, you dwell in us.
Help us to preserve this openness and to fight for it with all our hearts.
Help us to realize that there can be no
understanding where there is mutual rejection.
O God, in accepting one another
wholeheartedly, fully, completely, we accept you, and we thank you, and we adore you, and we love you with our whole being, because our being
is your being, our spirit is rooted in your spirit.
Fill us then with love, and let us be
bound together with love as we go our diverse ways, united in this one spirit which makes you present in
the world, and which makes you witness to the ultimate reality that is love.
Love has
overcome.
Love is victorious.
- Thomas Merton
Study
My parents did not accept the excuse that it
was “only toilet paper” when we high school friends “tee pee’d” a house even
though we pointed out that egging a car or throwing a rock was so very much
worse. They held to a higher standard,
we thought, than classmates who shared their stories of wild weekends. In this section of the Gospel, Jesus uses six
examples of behavior in which His disciples must exercise higher
standards. These are examples of what Jesus
would do.
In this passage, anger is portrayed as motive
to murder and insults such as “Raqa” are springboards to the deed.[i] Of course, not all name-calling results in
death, but there have been videos enough exposing that it is still happening
today. Jesus teaches us to strive for
more than merely following the letter of the law. Jesus asks us to dynamically reconcile, act
with integrity and respect others – our neighbors. He wants our thoughts, words and deeds to be
animated by love and mercy. Clearly this
is not a puny, hiding away type of living.
Gospel accounts of Jesus’ life demonstrate and in the Acts of the
Apostles we realize that discipleship calls for persistence, fidelity to the
Word not the world and reliance on God rather than the power of men.
Action
With whom are we at odds? How might we reconcile? Has our country begun to use terms like “red”
and “blue” like insults? Let us pray for
and seek common ground with our neighbors who might also be individuals of
another race, religion, political persuasion or nation. Listen for the voice of the Holy Spirit
rather than our inner voice wanting to win over.
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