Many will read today’s reading and Gospel with a sense of doom and gloom. However if you open your heart to listen and see through the eyes of the Lord our God; then you will find Him constantly praying for you and I. Where else can we find an almighty God who has no need of anything or anyone, lovingly lamenting even weeping over His creation? Of whom many remain obstinate, refusing to respond to His call, refusing to accept His love. Refusing to be reconciled to our loving God, choosing sin and total self reliance! Then there are many, who choose to remain lukewarm in their faith, thinking there will always be enough time for change!
Well the reminder for today is that we should rethink our strategy if we have one for living as children of God our Father. Yes indeed we have a loving and merciful God who is patiently waiting for our conversion of heart, to return fully unto Him. To be fully united with us as we are in Him. That being said we will have to face the consequences of our choice, even inactions when our time runs out!
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Amen
First reading
Isaiah 7:1-9 ·
Isaiah tells the king not to fearIn the reign of Ahaz son of Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, Razon the king of Aram went up against Jerusalem with Pekah son of Remaliah, king of Israel, to lay siege to it; but he was unable to capture it.
The news was brought to the House of David. ‘Aram’ they said ‘has reached Ephraim.’ Then the heart of the king and the hearts of the people shuddered as the trees of the forest shudder in front of the wind. The Lord said to Isaiah, ‘Go with your son Shear-jashub, and meet Ahaz at the end of the conduit of the upper pool on the Fuller’s Field road, and say to him:‘“Pay attention, keep calm, have no fear,
do not let your heart sink because of these two smouldering stumps of firebrands,
or because Aram, Ephraim and the son of Remaliah have plotted to ruin you, and have said:
Let us invade Judah and terrorise it and seize it for ourselves, and set up a king there, the son of Tabeel.
The Lord says this:
It shall not come true; it shall not be. The capital of Aram is Damascus, the head of Damascus, Razon; the capital of Ephraim, Samaria, the head of Samaria, the son of Remaliah. Six or five years more and a shattered Ephraim shall no longer be a people. But if you do not stand by me,
you will not stand at all.”’
Gospel
Matthew 11:20-24
It will not go as hard with Sodom on Judgement Day as with youJesus 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.’
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