20181214
FOLLOWING THE WAY OF
THE LORD LEADS TO LIFE
14 DECEMBER,
2018, Friday, 2nd Week, Advent
Readings at Mass
Liturgical Colour:
White.
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First reading
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Isaiah 48:17-19 ©
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If you had been alert to my
commandments, your happiness would have been like a river
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Thus says the Lord, your redeemer, the
Holy One of Israel:
I, the Lord, your God, teach you what is
good for you,
I lead you in the way that you must go.
If only you had been alert to my
commandments,
your happiness would have been like a
river,
your integrity like the waves of the sea.
Your children would have been numbered
like the sand,
your descendants as many as its grains.
Never would your name have been cut off or
blotted out before me.
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Responsorial Psalm
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Psalm 1:1-4,6 ©
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Anyone who follows you,
O Lord, will have the light of life.
Happy indeed is the man
who follows not the counsel of
the wicked;
nor lingers in the way of sinners
nor sits in the company of
scorners,
but whose delight is the law of the Lord
and who ponders his law day
and night.
Anyone who follows you,
O Lord, will have the light of life.
He is like a tree that is planted
beside the flowing waters,
that yields its fruit in due season
and whose leaves shall never
fade;
and all that he does shall
prosper.
Anyone who follows you,
O Lord, will have the light of life.
Not so are the wicked, not so!
For they like winnowed chaff
shall be driven away by the
wind:
for the Lord guards the way of the just
but the way of the wicked
leads to doom.
Anyone who follows you,
O Lord, will have the light of life.
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Gospel Acclamation
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Alleluia, alleluia!
See, the king, the Lord of the world, will
come.
He will free us from the yoke of our
bondage.
Alleluia!
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Or:
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Alleluia, alleluia!
The Lord will come, go out to meet him.
Great is his beginning and his reign will
have no end.
Alleluia!
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Gospel
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Matthew 11:16-19 ©
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The Spirit of your Father will be
speaking in you
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Jesus spoke to the crowds: ‘What
description can I find for this generation? It is like children shouting to
each other as they sit in the market place:
“We played the pipes for you,
and you wouldn’t dance;
we sang dirges,
and you wouldn’t be mourners.”
‘For John came, neither eating nor
drinking, and they say, “He is possessed.” The Son of Man came, eating and
drinking, and they say, “Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax
collectors and sinners.” Yet wisdom has been proved right by her actions.’
FOLLOWING THE WAY OF THE LORD LEADS TO
LIFE
SCRIPTURE READINGS: [ISA 48:17-19; MT 11:16-19 ]
Are you happy? Are you contented with your state
of life? Are you finding life such a burden and a chore? Are you at peace
with your loved ones, friends and colleagues? Perhaps we are feeling so
crippled by our problems, fears and anxieties or constrained by the circumstances
we find ourselves in. More often than not, we complain and lament about the
state we are in. It is true that sometimes, we have to just live by the
constraints imposed on us, particularly the state of life we have chosen,
especially marriage and religious life. Or sometimes because of the
office we hold in society, we are not able to do what we would like to
do. Indeed, some of us feel that we are like a bird in a golden cage,
trapped by the demands and expectations placed on us.
However, there are times when we
can do something about our situation. We need not consign ourselves
to eternal doom. More often than not, we have the solution but we are not
ready to embark on it. We know the right thing to do but we either lack
the motivation or the courage to act accordingly. This was
precisely the case in today’s gospel. Jesus told the crowds point blank,
“What description can I find for this generation? It is like children shouting
to each other as they sit in the market place: ‘We played the pipes for you,
and you wouldn’t dance; we sang dirges, and you wouldn’t be mourners.'”
They were simply uncooperative and looking for all kinds of excuses to reject
the Word of God. As Jesus bemoaned, “For John came, neither eating nor
drinking, and they say, ‘He is possessed.’ The Son of Man came, eating and
drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax
collectors and sinners.'”
So, too, like the Jews, we find
all kinds of excuses not to do the right thing. We find reasons why
we should not act. We are too tepid in our love for God and are contented
with a nominal faith. Our acknowledgment of sins in our life is too
general or vague to have real effect on our lives. We know that we are
generally sinners but many of us are not explicitly conscious of our sins
even. As a result, our determination to change or to live the gospel life
is weak and lukewarm. We are contented with a faith and a life that is
neither hot nor cold. We are quite happy with a generic faith in God.
This is similar to the
Israelites in the first reading. Again and again, like Jesus in today’s gospel, God has
been pleading with His people to repent and to change. From the time of
the Exodus till the era of the prophets, God had been constantly wooing the
people to turn to Him. But they kept falling back to sin and turned away
from the Lord despite all the miracles the Lord performed before them.
They never learnt their lesson. They neither listened to Moses nor the
rest of the Prophets. They broke and despised the covenantal laws
that the Lord had given to them through Moses. His laws were His
wisdom. Moses said, “See, I have taught you decrees and laws as the Lord
my God commanded me, so that you may follow them in the land you are entering
to take possession of it. Observe them carefully, for this will show your
wisdom and understanding to the nations, who will hear about all these decrees
and say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.” What
other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the Lord our
God is near us whenever we pray to him? And what other nation is so great as to
have such righteous decrees and laws as this body of laws I am setting before
you today? (Dt 4:5-7) In today’s
first reading, the Lord says, “I, the Lord, your God, teach you what is good
for you, I lead you in the way that you must go.”
Laws are never meant to stifle us.
They are the wisdom of God to guide us in our daily life and in making
decisions. To despise the Laws of God is to disregard His advice as to
how we should live our lives. We cannot live a life of true
freedom unless we learn to trust in His Wisdom expressed in the laws. This
is what the scripture lessons of today are challenging us. Are we ready
to give up our mindset and our views of life and happiness for that of our
Lord’s? Or do we still insist on our standards of what happiness entails
in life? It is our stubborn will and selfishness that lead us to much
pain and disastrous consequences. Like the Pharisees and the scribes, we
find all kinds of reasons to reject the teaching of Christ. Indeed,
Catholics are always seeking to find ways to avoid obeying the laws of the
gospel and of the Church, especially in areas of morality. We criticize
the Church’s authority and wisdom to teach us the truth about morality, as if
we all know better than the Church’s magisterium, the theologians and those
experts consulted in the area of ethics and morals. Like the
religious leaders of the day who sought to find reasons to reject Jesus and
John the Baptist. Either way, they would not accept either the call to
asceticism by John the Baptist or the way of celebration by Jesus.
Hence, it is not that there is no solution for us to find our way out but we
are not ready to follow it.
However, if we do follow the way
of the Lord, then we are promised happiness, integrity and fecundity.
Through Isaiah, the Lord promised us, “If only you had been alert to my
commandments, your happiness would have been like a river.” Indeed, it is
our failure to observe the commandments of God and His Wisdom that has landed
us in trouble because of our ignorance and self-will. But if we simply
follow His commandments, we would have been spared the consequences of our
follies, and happiness would have flowed like a river, unceasingly in our
lives.
Secondly, walking the
way of the Lord is to live integrated lives. If there is no peace in us, it is because
we live a double life. Our hearts are divided within us. Our mind
tells us something but our heart desires something else. We are torn
within us. Either way, we are not happy, nor at peace. We need to
align our mind and heart so that we can find peace and a clear
conscience. Otherwise, our heart will fight with our conscience and we
will always be unsettled. That is why finding peace requires
integrity. The prophet assures us that if we follow the way of the Lord,
our integrity will be “like the waves of the sea.” If we want to find peace,
then we must walk in the way of the just. “Those who follow you,
Lord, will have the light of life. Blessed the man who follows not the counsel
of the wicked nor walks in the way of sinners, nor sits in the company of the
insolent.”
Thirdly, those who follow the
wisdom of the Lord will always be fruitful in whatever they do. The
prophet said, “Your children would have been numbered like the sand, your
descendants as many as its grains.” In a similar vein, the psalmist
declares, “He is like a tree planted near running water, that yields its fruit
in due season and whose leaves never fade. Whatever he does, prospers.”
Truly, if we have a clear mind and a good heart, then we have nothing to fear
or be worried about unnecessarily. When we are sincere and truthful, we
will be able to deal accordingly with the situation called for. Quite
often, many of us are failures because we allow our problems and anger within
us to hinder us from giving ourselves fully to the task at hand. Instead
of working towards our goals, we are strategizing how to defeat our
enemies. Instead of improving ourselves, we are more worried about how to
destroy them.
So if we want to live
happy, integrated and fruitful lives, the psalmist urges us to meditate on the
Word of God constantly.
He said, those who delight “in the law of the Lord and meditates on his law day
and night” will peace and happiness. God said, “Never would your name
have been cut off or blotted out before me.” Conversely, there is a warning to
those who refuse to follow the Lord. “Those who follow you, Lord, will
have the light of life. Not so the wicked, not so; they are like chaff which
the wind drives away. For the Lord watches over the way of the just,
but the way of the wicked vanishes.”
At the end of the day, it is not just mere
words, but as Jesus challenges us, “Yet wisdom has been proved right by her
actions.” The taste of the pudding is in the eating. If
we want to know whether God’s promises are true or not, then we only need to
meditate and live the Word of God. Time will prove that God’s
wisdom is greater than man’s. God will in His time show us how
wrong we are. As Jesus said in John’s gospel, “When he comes, he will
prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and
judgment: about sin, because people do not believe in me; about
righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no
longer; and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands
condemned.” (Jn 16:8-11)
So let us take the
courage and respond to the gospel.
Let us pray for courage to give up our old way of life for the way of the
Gospel this Advent. Nothing ventured nothing gained. So we must
choose to walk the way of the Lord, the path of life. Instead of trusting
in our own judgment, let us for once surrender our judgment to God. He
will prove us wrong and we will be glad that we listened to Him rather than to
ourselves. Let us not find excuses anymore. Let us not find fault
with the Word of God, rather, let us examine ourselves and see the truth about
ourselves. Instead of blaming others for our misery, let us own up to our
failures and sins; and with humility, ask for forgiveness and pardon. We
are as much at fault as others. To think that others are causing us to be
miserable is but a failure to realize that we are causing others to suffer as
much or even more. So when the gospel is preached to us, unlike the Jews,
we must in all humility accept the Word of God for what it really is, as a
judgment on us calling for our repentance.
Written
by The Most Rev William Goh, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All
Rights Reserved
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