We all know what happens when we do not hear the Lord our God speaking to us through His Word. For we have all experienced it at what point or another in our lives! When we chose our ways and our will over His and the choices we made caused our lives to spin out of control. Self indulgent lifestyles, doing as we please not caring about others or the results of our actions. There were other times when all seem quiet in our lives but there was no peace or love in our hearts!
Today as we have embraced the endemic phase many have decided to throw caution in the air to do as they please. Party, Party, Party! And so everyone will have to face the consequences. Where is the mercy within us for others?
Have we lost sight of Christ Jesus our Saviour? Is He still very much present in our lives? He had come for us sinners, to free us from the bondages of sin. So that we can live our lives to the full in His peace and love. Let us turn our hearts back to Him, so that we can hear His word and will for us once again. Let us pray the first few lines of Psalm 119 together….
Blessed are those whose ways are blameless,
who walk according to the law of the Lord.
2 Blessed are those who keep his statutes
and seek him with all their heart—
3 they do no wrong
but follow his ways.
4 You have laid down precepts
that are to be fully obeyed.
5 Oh, that my ways were steadfast
in obeying your decrees!
6 Then I would not be put to shame
when I consider all your commands.
7 I will praise you with an upright heart
as I learn your righteous laws.
8 I will obey your decrees;
do not utterly forsake me.
Amen
First reading
Amos 8:4-6,9-12 ·
A famine not of bread, but of hearing the word of the Lord
Listen to this, you who trample on the needy
and try to suppress the poor people of the country,
you who say, ‘When will New Moon be over
so that we can sell our corn,
and sabbath, so that we can market our wheat?
Then by lowering the bushel, raising the shekel,
by swindling and tampering with the scales,
we can buy up the poor for money,
and the needy for a pair of sandals,
and get a price even for the sweepings of the wheat.’
That day – it is the Lord who speaks –
I will make the sun go down at noon,
and darken the earth in broad daylight.
I am going to turn your feasts into funerals,
all your singing into lamentation;
I will have your loins all in sackcloth,
your heads all shaved.
I will make it a mourning like the mourning for an only son,
as long as it lasts it will be like a day of bitterness.
See what days are coming – it is the Lord who speaks –
days when I will bring famine on the country,
a famine not of bread, a drought not of water,
but of hearing the word of the Lord.
They will stagger from sea to sea,
wander from north to east,
seeking the word of the Lord
and failing to find it.
Gospel
Matthew 9:9-13
It is not the healthy who need the doctor, but the sick
As Jesus was walking on, he saw a man named Matthew sitting by the customs house, and he said to him, ‘Follow me.’ And he got up and followed him.
While he was at dinner in the house it happened that a number of tax collectors and sinners came to sit at the table with Jesus and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, ‘Why does your master eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ When he heard this he replied, ‘It is not the healthy who need the doctor, but the sick. Go and learn the meaning of the words: What I want is mercy, not sacrifice. And indeed I did not come to call the virtuous, but sinners.’
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