Jesus is Our Guide, Our Good News and Our Provider

Jesus Invites us: "Come to Me."

During Independence Day weekend, we celebrate the Declaration of Independence which set in motion the United States of America. No American document has had a greater impact on the world in the human quest for freedom, equality, dignity, opportunity, and the laws to protect these.

So, we pray: God bless America so we may increasingly be, and long remain, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

In the Gospel according to Matthew, Jesus invites us, “Come to me.” He calls us to open our hearts to God and to our fellow human beings by giving God praise and worship; by being generous, by forgiving those who have wronged us, by caring. That’s why we gather in liturgy: to open our hearts.

The word of God first takes us back to the sixth century before Jesus. Zechariah speaks about a messianic leader who will usher in a new era of peace, justice and prosperity. He challenges us to always hope in God. Many philosophers argue that hope is a fundamental characteristic of human life. Think about it.

St. Paul in his letter to the Christian community at Rome speaks about the Spirit of God dwelling within us. We are living temples of God. The Spirit empowers us to live a life of integrity, courage, compassion and faith.

In the Gospel according to Matthew, Jesus begins with a prayer of praise. Then he invites us to enter his triune life: “Come to me, all you who find life burdensome and I will refresh you.”

Yes, when we begin to think life is empty, or heavy-laden, Jesus is there to fill our emptiness, to lighten our burdens. He is our true wisdom, the image of the God we cannot see, our guide, our good news and our provider.

God has bestowed the gifts of the Spirit in the life-giving waters of baptism: wisdom (to recognize what truly matters), intelligence (to discern what's true), courage, compassion, good judgment, and wonder and awe. Yes, Jesus will guide us to our true destiny.

The word “gospel” means “good news.” In a world that desperately needs good news, Jesus Christ lives and because he lives, we live. The good news of Jesus is dynamically relevant to all generations, cultures and situations. People’s basic needs are always the same. The message of the gospel is always the same. Set aside regular time to contemplate the scriptures.

Ultimately, Jesus taught us to pray. “Give us this day our daily bread...” God will provide all we need. If we give generously, we will discover that we cannot out-give God, who will do amazing things for and through us.

This doesn't mean life will be easy. Yet, Jesus is indeed our wisdom who guides us, brings us good news and provides for us so that we can become the best version of ourselves: with eternal life, liberty and justice, and the pursuit of true happiness.

Have a happy and safe Independence Day weekend.

Persevere in Prayer

The Bible Points to Jesus as THE Revelation of God

The word of God takes us back to a defining moment in the life of ancient Israel: the Exodus of the Hebrews from their oppressors. In the wilderness, the Hebrews encountered dangers everywhere. Here they are fighting. Moses, atop a hill, displays the staff of God, a symbol of God’s presence, and extends his hands, almost magically. Every time Moses lifts his hands up in prayer, the tide turns in favor of the Hebrews.

The message is simple: persevere in prayer, because God does hear us.

Paul here emphasizes the significance of the Bible and its importance in our lives. The Bible is the very breath of God which empowers us to be faithful disciples of Jesus.

In the Gospel according to Luke, the widow doesn’t give up in her demand for justice, and the judge eventually yields. The parable challenges us to persevere in doing what we can to right wrongs.

The Bible is a guide in life. Through the inspired word of God, it is a two-way conversation. We should be ever attentive and responsive to the word of God.

Yes, God authored the Bible in the sense that the Bible includes what God wants us to know about God, his relationship to the universe, and his purpose for us.

But the authors of the Bible were real authors, using the languages, images, literary genres, and worldviews they knew to communicate religious truths, not scientific theories. They knew nothing about evolution, the solar system, galaxies, or the International Space Station – which this past Friday conducted its first all-female spacewalk.

Moreover, the Bible is not one book, but a library of books written over 1,500 years by at least forty different authors—in prose and poetry, fiction and history, historical narratives and short stories, etc. The Bible often speaks symbolically, as in the parables of Jesus.

Just as we interpret literary genres differently, we have to interpret biblical literary genres differently, to discover more easily the fundamental religious truth that it is trying to communicate. The creation stories, for example, communicate religious truths. The biblical authors communicated through the cultural images and legends and traditions they knew.

I invite us to read the Bible prayerfully. Not to find specific answers to questions the biblical authors never thought about, but to become the kind of person for our day that Jesus was for his day.

The scriptures point to Jesus as the unique or definitive revelation of God to us. In other words, everything that God wanted to do for us or say to us, God did in Jesus. The Spirit in the global Catholic community guides us along the journey to our heavenly dwelling place, in light of new challenges in new generations and evolving cultures.

I invite us particularly to nourish our spiritual life through the Sunday readings in the Liturgy of the Word. We gather every Sunday in churches across the globe to listen to God in the Liturgy and to presence sacramentally and mystically Jesus Christ gloriously alive in the Eucharist, to become one with Him in Communion, and then to go forth to continue the ministry of Jesus Christ, until he comes again.