20150714 RECEIVING THE GRACE OF GOD IN VAIN
Readings at Mass
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First reading
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Exodus 2:1-15 ©
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There was a man of
the tribe of Levi who had taken a woman of Levi as his wife. She conceived and
gave birth to a son and, seeing what a fine child he was, she kept him hidden
for three months. When she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for
him; coating it with bitumen and pitch, she put the child inside and laid it
among the reeds at the river’s edge. His sister stood some distance away to see
what would happen to him.
Now
Pharaoh’s daughter went down to bathe in the river, and the girls attending her
were walking along by the riverside. Among the reeds she noticed the basket,
and she sent her maid to fetch it. She opened it and looked, and saw a baby
boy, crying; and she was sorry for him. ‘This is a child of one of the Hebrews’
she said. Then the child’s sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, ‘Shall I go and
find you a nurse among the Hebrew women to suckle the child for you?’ ‘Yes, go’
Pharaoh’s daughter said to her; and the girl went off to find the baby’s own
mother. To her the daughter of Pharaoh said, ‘Take this child away and suckle
it for me. I will see you are paid.’ So the woman took the child and suckled
it. When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter who treated
him like a son; she named him Moses because, she said, ‘I drew him out of the
water.’
Moses, a
man by now, set out at this time to visit his countrymen, and he saw what a
hard life they were having; and he saw an Egyptian strike a Hebrew, one of his
countrymen. Looking round he could see no one in sight, so he killed the
Egyptian and hid him in the sand. On the following day he came back, and there
were two Hebrews, fighting. He said to the man who was in the wrong, ‘What do
you mean by hitting your fellow countryman?’ ‘And who appointed you’ the man
retorted, ‘to be prince over us, and judge? Do you intend to kill me as you
killed the Egyptian?’ Moses was frightened. ‘Clearly that business has come to
light’ he thought. When Pharaoh heard of the matter he would have killed Moses,
but Moses fled from Pharaoh and made for the land of Midian.
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Psalm
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Psalm
68:3,14,30-31,33-34 ©
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Seek the Lord, you
who are poor, and your hearts will revive.
I have sunk into the
mud of the deep
and there
is no foothold.
I have entered the
waters of the deep
and the
waves overwhelm me.
Seek the Lord, you
who are poor, and your hearts will revive.
This is my prayer to
you,
my prayer
for your favour.
In your great love,
answer me, O God,
with your
help that never fails.
Seek the Lord, you
who are poor, and your hearts will revive.
As for me in my
poverty and pain
let your
help, O God, lift me up.
I will praise God’s
name with a song;
I will
glorify him with thanksgiving.
Seek the Lord, you
who are poor, and your hearts will revive.
The poor when they
see it will be glad
and
God-seeking hearts will revive;
for the Lord listens
to the needy
and does
not spurn his servants in their chains.
Seek the Lord, you
who are poor, and your hearts will revive.
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Gospel
Acclamation
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Ps118:24
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Alleluia, alleluia!
Train me, Lord, to
observe your law,
to keep it with my
heart.
Alleluia!
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Or
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Ps94:8
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Alleluia, alleluia!
Harden not your
hearts today,
but listen to the
voice of the Lord.
Alleluia!
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Gospel
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Matthew 11:20-24
©
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Jesus began to
reproach the towns in which most of his miracles had been worked, because they
refused to repent.
‘Alas
for you, Chorazin! Alas for you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles done in you had
been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and
ashes. And still, I tell you that it will not go as hard on Judgement day with
Tyre and Sidon as with you. And as for you, Capernaum, did you want to be
exalted as high as heaven? You shall be thrown down to hell. For if the
miracles done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have been standing yet.
And still, I tell you that it will not go as hard with the land of Sodom on
Judgement day as with you.’
RECEIVING
THE GRACE OF GOD IN VAIN
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SCRIPTURE
READINGS: EX 2:1-15;
MT 11:20-24
“Alas
for you, Chorazin! Alas for you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles done in
you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in
sackcloth and ashes.” These words of Jesus must have been uttered from a
wounded and sorrowful heart. We can imagine how Jesus must have felt in
His ministry. St John captured it so poignantly when he wrote “He came to
that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.” (Jn 1;11) Jesus who loved
His people so much and who came for them even instructed His disciples “not to
go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. Go rather to
the lost sheep of Israel.” (Mt 10:5f)
This
ingratitude was similarly reflected in the case of the Hebrew who was bullying
his fellowman. When Moses tried to reconcile the rift between his two
countrymen, instead of being seen as a peacemaker, the man who was in the wrong
accused Moses of trying to control him. In his vindictiveness, he exposed
Moses for killing the Egyptian. This caused Moses to suffer the wrath of
Pharaoh and as a result he had to flee from Egypt to take refuge in the land of
Midian. Again we have a case of returning evil for a good deed
done. Moses meant well for his countrymen but instead of being grateful
to Moses, his countryman’s selfishness took the better part of him.
I am
sure many of us can feel with Jesus and Moses, for we too are often rejected by
the very people whom we love. We make sacrifices for them. We try
to provide them with whatever they need. We go out of our way to help
them in every way we can. We give in to their demands, sometimes even
when such requests are unreasonable. And yet, in spite of all we do, what
we receive in return is not just ingratitude but fault-finding as well, even
when we are not obliged to do what we did for them. What is even more
discouraging is that for all the good we do, instead of becoming better
persons, they become lazier, irresponsible, ungrateful and demanding.
The
failure to respond to grace is the gist of today’s gospel. The scripture
readings invite us to consider the graces that we have received from God.
Like the Chosen People of God, we fail to take cognizance of the many wonderful
graces we have received from Him with respect to our faith, life, health,
material sufficiency, loved ones and friends. Miracles are happening all around
us every day and yet we are so blind to the wondrous works that God is doing
for us and with us. We fail to see these as signs from God, tokens of His
love and mercy for us.
Instead,
most of us take God and His graces for granted. In Singapore, we are so
fortunate in that there are ample avenues for those of us who are serious about
deepening our faith. We have the daily Eucharist celebrated at our
parishes, and as if these are not near enough, we even have the Eucharist
brought to the vicinity of our work place. We have plenty of Adoration
chapels open for us to pray in comfort. There is even one, the Perpetual
Adoration Chapel at CSC, which is open 24 hours throughout the year. For
those of us who are internet savvy, there are plenty of websites that offer
scripture reflections for the day. In terms of faith formation, we have
talks, seminars and retreats in the parishes and our retreat houses. And
if we need community, there are neighbourhood groups and numerous movements and
organizations to join, according to the charisms God has bestowed us
with. But how many of us avail of these resources? More
importantly, how many of us are making full use of the graces given to us so
that we can deepen our faith and grow in charity for ourselves and for each other?
Not
only do we take God and our faith for granted, we take our loved ones for
granted as well. It is ironical that we are more grateful to strangers
and acquaintances who help us with small favours now and then, rather than to
our friends and loved ones who spend much time and resources on us. The
love and kindness shown to us by our spouse and intimate friends seem to be
something owed to us and not perceived as graces given to us. When we
take people for granted, especially those who are close to us, we do not grow
in our love for them. We are not appreciative because what is supposedly
a gift from their goodness is seen as a right due to us.
Finally,
most of us have received the blessings of God in vain. God has blessed us
with talents, wealth, health, career and success, yet we do not use our
resources to help others, to contribute to the Church and society.
Instead of using what the Lord has blessed us with for the good of humanity, we
use them only for ourselves. Worse still are those who use their talents
and resources for evil purposes, to manipulate others, to acquire more power
and wealth for themselves.
If we
have received the grace of God in vain, there will be serious repercussions.
Jesus has this to say to us, “And still, I tell you that it will not go as hard
on Judgment day with Tyre and Sidon as with you. And as for you,
Capernaum, did you want to be exalted as high as heaven? You shall be
thrown down to hell. For if the miracles done in you had been done in
Sodom, it would have been standing yet. And still, I tell you that it
will not go as hard as the land of Sodom on Judgement day as with you.” In
warning them about the imminent judgment, He was not saying that God is a
vindictive and merciless God. On the contrary, Jesus was trying to
express the lamentation of God who could not bear to see the self-destruction
of His people. The truth is that what we sow will be what we reap.
The disastrous consequences will be brought upon by ourselves. For
failing to use the graces of God responsibly and gratefully, we will cause
ourselves and even our innocent loved ones to be destroyed by our sins.
Today,
we are called to be responsible like Moses in the first reading. It was
by grace that Moses’ life was saved by Pharaoh’s daughter. It was by
grace that he was given all the privileges of being brought up in the palace,
given a good education and upbringing. We can be certain that Moses did
not take all his blessings for granted. He knew that it was his God who
endowed him with all that he had and all that he was. He also knew that
what he had received was not meant for himself but for his people. So
when his fellow Hebrew was ill treated, he stood up for him, even to the extent
of taking an Egyptian’s life while defending the rights of a slave!
So if
we feel that we have not been gracious and responsible for the graces we have
received, let us repent from such an attitude. As Jesus rightly said, if
only others had received what we have received, they would have changed so much
for the better than us. Aren’t we better than Jesus’
contemporaries? Like the Chosen People of God, we were slaves like them
in Egypt. They were nobody. Yet God had chosen them, a motley crowd
of slaves, to be His own people. He chose them not because they were wise
and powerful but because they were sinners and slaves. God too has
blessed us, for without His blessings, we would not be where we are
today. Let us repent of our selfish and heartless attitudes towards His
love for us and the love mediated to us by the people in our lives.
Otherwise, we will only live to regret when these blessings are taken away from
us.
Written
by The Most Rev William Goh
Roman
Catholic Archbishop of Singapore
© All Rights Reserved
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