READINGS for 2008-11-30
COmING bACK
“Why do you let us wander, O Lord?” – Isaiah 63:17
It’s been two years since I wrote my last reflection. I could feel this yearning inside me. Something kept nagging me to get back into the loop.
And so here I am, a resurrected writer of Didache after two years of hibernation. Nobody asked me to stop writing. It just fell between the cracks, something that I ended up regretting. It got drowned out when I ventured into the world of the academe to pursue a doctorate degree and teach at a premier graduate school of business.
But all the management learnings as a doctoral student and all the case room discussions as a professor left me wanting and wandering. I wanted to share God’s love once again through the ordinary experiences of my life with the countless and faceless Didache readers around the world.
If I am able to touch even just one heart with my reflection, I will be full of joy. Mari Garcia
REFLECTION:
Do you have the desire to share your time, talent and treasure?
Now is a good time. Lord do not let me wander far from You. I want to share Your love with others today.
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1st READING
Let us never forget that we are the work of our Father in Heaven. It is He who formed us in the womb and has created us to be the particular person we are with our gifts, talents and personalities. Each of us is an individual, a gift to the world capable of bringing something unique to the human project. Let us seek to fulfill our potential and so be faithful to all God asks us to do.
Isaiah 63:16b-17, 19b; 64:2-7
16 You, LORD, are our father, our redeemer you are named forever. 17 Why do you let us wander, O LORD, from your ways, and harden our hearts so that we fear you not? Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your heritage. 19 Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, with the mountains quaking before you, 64: 2 while you wrought awesome deeds we could not hope for, 3 such as they had not heard of from of old. No ear has ever heard, no eye ever seen, any God but you doing such deeds for those who wait for him. 4 Would that you might meet us doing right, that we were mindful of you in our ways! Behold, you are angry, and we are sinful; 5 all of us have become like unclean men, all our good deeds are like polluted rags; we have all withered like leaves, and our guilt carries us away like the wind. 6 There is none who calls upon your name, who rouses himself to cling to you; for you have hidden your face from us and have delivered us up to our guilt. 7 Yet, O LORD, you are our father; we are the clay and you the potter we are all the work of your hands.
P S A L M
Psalm 80:2-3, 15-16, 18-19 (4)
R: Lord, make us turn to you; let us see your face and we shall be saved.
2 O shepherd of Israel, hearken, O guide of the flock of Joseph! From your throne upon the cherubim, shine forth 3 Rouse your power, and come to save us. (R) 15 Once again, O LORD of hosts, look down from heaven, and see; take care of this vine, 16 and protect what your right hand has planted the son of man whom you yourself made strong. (R) 18 May your help be with the man of your right hand, with the son of man whom you yourself made strong. 19 Then we will no more withdraw from you; give us new life, and we will call upon your name. (R)
2nd READING
We have so many people to thank for the contributions they have made to our education or character formation. Let us take a moment to think about them and then say a quick prayer in gratitude and thanksgiving for their commitment and generosity towards us. At the same time, let us call to mind the roles we are playing in the lives of others in a similar respect. Let us pray for the grace to discharge our duties and responsibilities well!
1 Corinthians 1:3-9
3 Brothers and sisters: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 4 I give thanks to my God always on your account for the grace of God bestowed on you in Christ Jesus, 5 that in him you were enriched in every way, with all discourse and all knowledge, 6 as the testimony to Christ was confirmed among you, 7 so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ. 8 He will keep you firm to the end, irreproachable on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 God is faithful, and by him you were called to fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
G O S P E L
Sleeping often has a pejorative sense to it in the Scriptures. Jesus is not condemning sleep as such as He knows sleep is a necessary part of human existence. What is condemned here under the term “sleep” is an apathy or attitude that does not really care about the things that matter in life. In other words, if we are not willing to be disciplined, and remain alert to the attacks of the enemy, we will ultimately succumb to them and there is nothing God can do about this! The choice is ours. Are you willing to be disciplined in the way you follow Jesus as your Lord and Savior?
Mark 13:33-37
33 Jesus said to his disciples: “Be watchful! Be alert! You do not know when the time will come. 34 It is like a man traveling abroad. He leaves home and places his servants in charge, each with his work, and orders the gatekeeper to be on the watch. 35 Watch, therefore; you do not know when the lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning. 36 May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping. 37 What I say to you, I say to all: ‘Watch!’ ”
my reflections
think:Are you willing to be disciplined in the way you follow Jesus as your Lord and Savior?
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God’s special verse/thought for me today________________ _________________________________________________________
T O D A Y ’ S BLESSING LIST Thank You Lord for: ____________________________________
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READ THE BIBLE IN ONE YEAR Ezekiel 21-23
SABBATH PAUSE
My weekly time with God
THANK YOU LIST
Things to be grateful for from the past week
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SPECIAL NEEDS
Things to ask God for in the coming week
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HIDDEN TREASURE
Most important word God told me this week
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KAIROS
Today is the First Sunday of Advent. It is the New Year of the Church. Happy New Year! The choice to make this new liturgical year truly happy is yours to make. Choose to make this new liturgical year really happy, really blest, really grace- illed by living through it and living by it. Celebrate every moment. Savor every grace. Benefit lavishly from all the sacraments. Ponder on God’s Word each day. God gives us every means to make the year overflow with His blessings.
The first four weeks of this new liturgical year carry the theme of waiting. I find this rather interesting. Why not start the year with the Birth of the Lord at once? After all, isn’t that what determines the start of the present Common Era? So, why start the year with a period of waiting? And four weeks of waiting!
While we commonly associate Advent with our waiting for the Lord’s coming, it may do well for us to reflect on it also as the Lord’s waiting for His arrival. He, too, needed to wait before He was born in Bethlehem. He waits each day to give Himself to us in the Holy Eucharist. And He continues waiting when the Father will tell Him, “It’s time, My Son. Your Second Coming has come. Go and wield the sickle. Gather the harvest of the Kingdom.”
Waiting is very important even to the Lord. He waits with the Father for us to come to our senses, for us to come home, and He jumps with joy at the idea of throwing a lavish party at our return. He does not force Himself on us as He patiently invites us to belong to His Kingdom. He waits for the right time. He waits for the time of grace, the kairos.
Between His first coming and His final return, we meet the Lord in the Eucharist and in one another even as we wait for Him. When we meet Him and allow His love to work in and through us, it is a time of grace. It is kairos. That is what Christmas is all about, is it not? A time of grace-made-flesh: kairos. And it is kairos that makes not only the liturgical year, but our whole life, truly happy and blest. Fr. Bobby Titco
Reflection Question:
I will live my life as kairos as I wait for the Lord’s return.
Jesus, my Lord, You are God- Made-Flesh. You are Kairos- Incarnate. Make me Your grace. Make me kairos-incarnate like You. Amen.
St. Tudwal, Welsh monk and bishop, pray for us.
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