20150222 LENT – A TIME TO RENEW THE COVENANT
Readings at Mass
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First reading
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Genesis 9:8-15 ©
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God spoke to Noah and
his sons, ‘See, I establish my Covenant with you, and with your descendants
after you; also with every living creature to be found with you, birds, cattle
and every wild beast with you: everything that came out of the ark, everything
that lives on the earth. I establish my Covenant with you: no thing of flesh
shall be swept away again by the waters of the flood. There shall be no flood
to destroy the earth again.’
God said,
‘Here is the sign of the Covenant I make between myself and you and every
living creature with you for all generations: I set my bow in the clouds and it
shall be a sign of the Covenant between me and the earth. When I gather the
clouds over the earth and the bow appears in the clouds, I will recall the
Covenant between myself and you and every living creature of every kind. And so
the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all things of flesh.’
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Psalm
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Psalm 24:4-6,7-9
©
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Your ways, Lord,
are faithfulness and love for those who keep your covenant.
Lord, make me know
your ways.
Lord,
teach me your paths.
Make me walk in your
truth, and teach me:
for you
are God my saviour.
Your ways, Lord,
are faithfulness and love for those who keep your covenant.
Remember your mercy,
Lord,
and the
love you have shown from of old.
In your love remember
me.
because
of your goodness, O Lord.
Your ways, Lord,
are faithfulness and love for those who keep your covenant.
The Lord is good and
upright.
He shows
the path to those who stray,
He guides the humble
in the right path,
He teaches
his way to the poor.
Your ways, Lord,
are faithfulness and love for those who keep your covenant.
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Second reading
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1 Peter 3:18-22 ©
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Christ himself,
innocent though he was, had died once for sins, died for the guilty, to lead us
to God. In the body he was put to death, in the spirit he was raised to life,
and, in the spirit, he went to preach to the spirits in prison. Now it was long
ago, when Noah was still building that ark which saved only a small group of
eight people ‘by water’, and when God was still waiting patiently, that these
spirits refused to believe. That water is a type of the baptism which saves you
now, and which is not the washing off of physical dirt but a pledge made to God
from a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has
entered heaven and is at God’s right hand, now that he has made the angels and
Dominations and Powers his subjects.
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Gospel
Acclamation
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Mt4:4
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Praise to you, O
Christ, king of eternal glory!
Man does not live on
bread alone,
but on every word
that comes from the mouth of God.
Praise to you, O
Christ, king of eternal glory!
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Gospel
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Mark 1:12-15 ©
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The Spirit drove
Jesus out into the wilderness and he remained there for forty days, and was
tempted by Satan. He was with the wild beasts, and the angels looked after him.
After
John had been arrested, Jesus went into Galilee. There he proclaimed the Good
News from God. ‘The time has come’ he said ‘and the kingdom of God is close at
hand. Repent, and believe the Good News.’
LENT
– A TIME TO RENEW THE COVENANT
SCRIPTURE
READINGS: GENESIS 9:8-15; 1PETER 3:18-22; MARK 1:12-15
“Repent,
and believe the Good News.” What is this Good News? The Good
News is simply this. God loves us and want us to share in His
happiness, His life and love. He has chosen us to be holy and
blameless so that we can be His adopted sons and daughters. Indeed, if
you have been reflecting on the weekday Mass readings in these last two weeks,
you would have read of the original intent of God’s creation. God created
everything and found it to be good. God wants us to live in paradise by
trusting in His love. He desires to have full communion with us.
But man wants
autonomy. He wants to exist independently of God, which is what the Story
of the Fall is all about. Left to himself, he became confused. He became
anxious and insecure as he decided to take his life into his own hands instead of
allowing God to provide for him. Competing with his fellowmen, he was led
to jealousy and even to murder. Following the Story of the Fall, we see
the progression of sin culminating in the Story of Noah and the Ark. So
evil did man become that God, for the sake of the rest of humanity, allowed the
flood to wipe out the whole human race save for Noah and his family who were
faithful to Him. The flood that destroyed humanity is but the
illustration of the consequences of human sins. By not respecting nature
and creation, nature unleashes its own punishment on man. He is
punished not so much by God but by his own sins and the consequences of his
actions.
The flood was an attempt
by God to restore mankind to its pristine stage. Hence, we have the beginning
of the Covenant with the whole of humanity. “God spoke to Noah and his sons, See, I
establish my Covenant with you, and with your descendants after you; also with
every living creature to be found with you, birds, cattle and every wild beast
with you: everything that came out of the ark, everything that lives on the
earth. I establish my Covenant with you: nothing of flesh shall be swept away
again by the waters of the flood. There shall be no flood to destroy the earth
again.”
But the tragedy is that
man continues to sin.
He could not wipe the slate clean. The failures of their ancestors
continued unabated as before. Sin and infidelity continued.
Why?
The reason is simply
because of Original Sin. What do we mean by Original Sin? It simply means that our operating
system is dysfunctional. The human person is wounded right from within
his nature. It is not just the environment that caused him to sin, or the
bad examples of others. For this reason, even though technically, Noah
and his family had a fresh start, yet the heart of man was still inclined to
sin. It was a matter of time that their selfishness and greed would be
expressed anew. Like a computer that has an outdated operating system or
an infected operating system, the virus will destroy whatever data or programs
that have been installed. And even if the virus is not that deadly, the
computer cannot function properly. This, too, is the case for
humanity. We are wounded. Our operating system is contaminated by virus.
We need to repair the operating system and we need a new program.
The Good News is that
Jesus comes to restore us. “After John had been arrested, Jesus went into Galilee. There he
proclaimed the Good News from God.” He comes to repair the Operating System by
giving us the Spirit so that we could be restored to the kingdom. Through
His saving grace, He is going to wipe off all the virus of sins in our
lives. He is going to heal our wounded nature by giving us His
grace.
How faithful indeed is
our God. We
might not be faithful to Him and to the Covenant He made with us, but He
remains faithful to His covenant. He is true to His promise that He would
never destroy humanity again. “Here is the sign of the Covenant I make
between myself and you and every living creature with you for all generations:
I set my bow in the clouds and it shall be a sign of the Covenant between me
and the earth. When I gather the clouds over the earth and the bow appears in
the clouds, I will recall the Covenant between myself and you and every living
creature of every kind. And so the waters shall never again become a flood to
destroy all things of flesh.”
How does God restore our
dignity as His children? He sent us Christ His only Son to show us how to
live as authentic human persons. Jesus as man sought to do His Father’s will. Like
every man, He was tempted. We read in the gospel, “The Spirit drove Jesus
out into the wilderness and he remained there for forty days, and was tempted
by Satan. He was with the wild beasts, and the angels looked after him.”
But He did not succumb to temptation. He resisted the Evil One and
submitted to His Father so humbly even unto death. Indeed, He overcame
sin by dying to self. “Christ himself, innocent though he was,
died once for sins, died for the guilty, to lead us to God.”
The Lord wants to lead
us out of our prison caused by sin and selfishness. “In the body he was put to
death, in the spirit he was raised to life, and, in the spirit, he went to
preach to the spirits in prison.” In our fear of death and the need to
survive, we fall into sin. Our lives are miserable, because we cannot
forgive, we cannot let go of the past, we think ill of others, we hoard and are
always envious of others. When we are full of anger, bitterness and possessiveness,
we cannot be happy. Sin enslaves us and makes us our own prisoners
because we dare not let go.
During the season of
Lent, the Church invites us to we renew this covenant. As the psalmist says, “Remember
your mercy, Lord, and the love you have shown from of old. In your love
remember me, because of your goodness, O Lord.” How could this covenant
be renewed?
Firstly, we need to
repent and believe
the Good News. This means to accept Jesus as the way to
salvation. Jesus is the Good News in person, the Word of God and the
compassion of the Father. Like Jesus, we need to be baptized like
Him. The normal way to accept Jesus of course is through baptism, which
is the gateway to grace. Baptism is but to be reborn in the Spirit so
that we become sons and daughters of God in the Son. Just as the people
during Noah’s time were saved by the waters, so, too, Christians are reborn
again in the Spirit through the waters of baptism.
How could the waters of
baptism save us?
St Peter says, “That water is a type of the baptism which saves you now, and
which is not the washing off of physical dirt but a pledge made to God from a
good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has entered
heaven and is at God’s right hand, now that he has made the angels and
Dominations and Powers his subjects.” Through the resurrection of Christ
and giving of the Holy Spirit, God uses the water to cleanse us of our sins,
give us a rebirth in the Holy Spirit, thereby making us His adopted children in
Christ.
But baptism is an ongoing
process. We are baptized with water once but our entire life
must be given up to the significance of baptism which is to die to our sins and
ourselves. Jesus’ baptism at the beginning of His ministry is
but the anticipation of His baptism of suffering and death. Indeed, St
Paul could make the link between baptism and death only because Jesus did
so. He said, “I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it
were already kindled! I have a baptism with which to be
baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! (Lk
12:49f) St Paul wrote “Do you not know that all of us who have been
baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been
buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from
the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of
life.” (Rom 6:3f) We are to follow Christ into the waters by dying
to our sins and rising anew in the life of the Spirit.
To die to ourselves
means to be freed from our sins. Lent is a time to renew our covenant
with the Lord by renouncing sin and living a righteous life in the
Spirit. As the psalmist says, “Lord, make me know your ways. Lord, teach me your paths. Make me
walk in your truth, and teach me: for you are God my saviour. The Lord is good
and upright. He shows the path to those who stray. He guides the humble
in the right path. He teaches his way to the poor.”
But we cannot fight
against the Evil One or overcome sins with small means. We need to rely
on God’s grace, like Jesus. “The Spirit drove Jesus out into the wilderness and he remained
there for forty days, and was tempted by Satan. He was with the wild beasts,
and the angels looked after him.” We too must ask the Holy Spirit and His
angels to look after us and pray especially to St Michael to defend us against
the snares of the devil. This grace is given to us in a special way through the
sacrament of reconciliation, the celebration of the Eucharist, a devout
contemplation on the Word of God, fasting, penance and mortifications; and
prayer.
Lent is a spring
festival. It is the beginning of new life. So if we want to
celebrate this new life, then we must be receptive to the graces that God is
going to give us, as St Paul wrote, “As we work together with him, we
urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain. For he says, ‘At an
acceptable time I have listened to you, and on a day of salvation I have helped
you.’ See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation!”
WRITTEN BY THE MOST REV
WILLIAM GOH
ARCHBISHOP
OF SINGAPORE
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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