Kind and Merciful God

 

 Third Sunday of Lent

20 March 2022

 

First Reading: EX 3:1-8a, 13-15

Responsorial Psalm: PS 103: 1-2, 3-4, 6-7, 8, 11

Second Reading: 1 COR 10:1-6, 10-12

Gospel: LK 13:1-9

 

Reflection

By: Jose Paulo M. Gonzales

 

Truth be told: many of us believe that the good that we experience, we deserve. The tendency can be stronger for Christians. Since we strive to stay close to the Lord in how we live, likely it is for us to think: "Ah, I am reaping all these good fruits because I have kept good with the Lord." God certainly likes to bless His faithful. It is a delight for Him to see us walk in His leading; but there is something unchristian with this thinking. As easy it is to believe that we deserve what we enjoy because we have been good, it is just as easy to hold those with their misfortune deserving of their predicament. In our minds, they must have been done something wrong to be meted those punishments. We worship a just God, do we not? But what will happen when we come across our own mishaps? We may ruminate repeatedly: "I have tried my best to be a good Christian. Why do I still have trouble?" A conundrum like this could further make us question: "Have I been bad? Do I worship a just God? How does God's justice work?"

"Thank God", I saw from a Facebook post. It was a reference to Psalm 130:3 For–"If you, Lord, kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand?" If only we realize how easy it could be for anyone to sin, perhaps no one will want to claim first in God's questioning. "Anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart" (Matthew 5:28); "anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment; [...] anyone who says to a brother or sister, 'Raca,' is answerable to the court; and anyone who says, 'You fool!' will be in danger of the fire of hell" (Matthew 5:22). If these simple occurrences already count as sins, there can be more that we are guilty of without our knowing. Sinful though we are, why then are we still blessed? First, we must realize that it is not our works that win God's favor: "It is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God not—by works, so that no one can boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9). If it is not our works that determine who gets grace, it follows that it is not our righteousness that predicts who receives God's goodwill; it is, instead, God's generosity: "[God] causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous" (Matthew 5:45). If God blesses both the good and the wicked, can we ever be sure that His justice would stay as clear cut as we expect? Not so, at least not in the way we understand justice. For the way we hold justice is limited—even juvenile compared to God's definition of justice. Whom we deem guilty can well differ from the opinion of One who can see everything clearly. God is the One who sees and knows it all—He is omniscient; He is ever-present and powerful—He is omnipotent. If our senses can notice only so many objects and our minds can store and interpret only so much information, how trusting can we be of our judgment? How confident can we be to say who is with sin? And how confident can we be that we are free of guilt? "Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone..." (John 8:7).

We must not make of ourselves as though spotless slates, for all do sin, and there only need beheld one thing we treasure dearly to reveal: we can all be impassioned towards evil. Everyone has as much propensity to sin as those they hold despicable, and between persons, the sight of one's evil does not make anyone a perfect judge, for in different circumstances who is judge, who is victim, who is perpetrator - these would change. The only thing that differentiates us from each other is our buffer, whatever it could be: conscience, fear of God, the fallout with our well-meaning loved ones, the prospect of what we would lose and whom else we would hurt, and many more. All sin under the eyes of God who sees it all, and chance only needs to catch us open to determine who gets convicted, but it remains—all sin whether in broad daylight or behind closed doors; and the Good News is this: we are not without forgiveness; not without a Savior. Jesus Christ is the Name by which we will be saved. Furthermore, the teachings of the Church would reveal to us an innateness to our person that is defined not ultimately by our concupiscence—our very tendency to sin—but by our being made in the Image and Likeness of God. Therefore,  we discover that it is not our sins that constitute our character. If anything, they detract us from becoming our true selves in God.

God's justice is so good to understand these dynamics of ours that I curiously pose, if I may, that the reason we are handed what is right and what is evil is to precisely establish the basic condition by which we can all live in peace; but God's thoughts are not our thoughts and His ways, higher than ours (Isaiah 55:8-9); God's work goes way beyond assigning accountability. If God knows very well that everyone falls short and who is guilty and greatly predicted by who is seen faltering for the time, we will understand why He stresses to the fore the three most universal values: faith, hope, and the greatest of these—love (1 Corinthians 13). Love is the virtue that binds everyone together in fraternal communion. God, knowing our frailties and how encumbering they can be, wants us to focus instead on the remedies: the virtue-solutions! Love—its true and divinely guided expression—is enough to encompass every good we should do to each other, including every evil we should withdraw from, for "love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law"  (Romans 13:10). The way to this love starts with the first step: repentance of our own wrongdoings. It is repentance that makes possible a more transformative reconciliation with the Lord and others. The Gospel for today (Luke 13:1-9) emphasizes the purpose of this repentance: so we do not perish at the appointed time. We know that we invoke the right spirit to repentance when we are driven not exclusively by the urge to call out others on their wrongs, but when we make good of ourselves as good we intend to make of others.

The parable that Jesus told about the fig tree that would not bear fruit can be likened to us in times when we are fruitless or unproductive. The work of good can take years of tedious struggling and would not stop until one's final breath, and there could be great compulsion to stop all efforts when there are no good results. Thankfully, as patient Jesus is, He advises us to be patient with ourselves and others; for in time, we may finally produce the good fruit we seek. Until then, we can always ask the Lord for help, and we will find no better companion than Him. Along these lines, I remember a quote from Alexander Den Heijer: "When a flower does not bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower." This quote reminds us not to discount the environment in which we grow. While we could take great care to become "flowers"—or our best state so to speak, we must place as much attention towards our environment and all the factors that compose it, such as the places we frequent, the messages we consume, and most of all, the people we regularly surround ourselves with. Our environment, among other things we put into our nature, can be just as crucial to our spiritual growth and fidelity. Therefore, if there is no better companion than Christ, then we know Who to look for to help us the whole way.

Prayer

Lord, thank You for being our good Father and for all the graces You give us. May You help us know where we are at fault and to acknowledge them genuinely so that as heartfelt our contrition is, so our reconciliation with You and others will be. In our intention to know where we could improve, may we follow Your spirit and rightful instruction so we advise each other not only with the urge to correct, but chiefly with love, communion, forgiveness, and reconciliation. May we follow Your ways in our dealings with You, others, and ourselves. These we ask in Jesus' Most Holy Name, Amen.