5th Sunday of Lent (B) 17 March 2024 Sermon

 5^th Sunday of Lent 17 March 2024 Transformation

 There will be no need for brother no need to say to brother… (first reading)

 Jesus comes to save us, which is always our greatest need.

 His saving is not just some technical matter, like having a debt removed.

 Deep within them I will plant my law (Jer 31,31-34) 1^st reading, We are being changed by God. All that is negative can be made positive. Malice to goodness, vice to virtue etc

A person may be mostly rotten now, but through mercy and grace become good, not only looking good through external actions, but actually being good.

A good person is one who never sins and always does what is good, with all desires, thoughts, passions etc are in the right place and right amount. Most importantly the will is in conformity with God's will.

1  Cor 13,1-3: even if I give my body to be burnt but have not love…I am a gong booming etc.

This means that without the right interior dispositions the external actions mean very little. What we do for God must be at least some part motivated by love.

Salvation is complete when we want and do the right thing; when we do whatever we do for the glory of God, always asking His help..

Many would say that being good all the time and in every way is too demanding and mostly impossible. Therefore it should not be insisted on.

Granted, weakness is prominent but we can do certain things to be strengthened.

A combination of prayer, sacraments, liturgy, good deeds will do much to advance us in spiritual maturity, whereby we are changed as we go, and what might have been impossible is now seen as reasonably attainable.

When sufficiently immersed in God's love we can see everything in a clearer light and charity prevails.

God plants His goodness in us, so it is not so hard as it sounds. God Himself is good in the fullest sense of the word, and has no wrong thoughts, words or actions.

In His earthly life Jesus always got it right – helped by the fact that He wanted all the right things anyway.

If we trust the real God enough to follow Him into unknown ways we will be vindicated. The difficult part is that we have to trust in the good outcome before we see it, or even before we see signs of it.

Let us work on our weakness and frailties and see what can be changed. A lot of it is just small adjustments, exercising restraint, changing orientation .

Whatever is missing can be found. The Salvation story continues.

We enter the last weeks before Easter, entering them as participants not just spectators or passers-by.

It involves us. We can commit fully or half or none, but we must make a decision.

Jesus invites each of us to respond fully to Him. He sees us individually, not just as a large crowd.

Salvation then can be seen as essentially an act of healing by God. If we have a physical need we go to whatever source of relief there might be.

Think of the spiritual life as going to the place where we can grow in charity. We need charity and all its connections more than we need health or peace or any other item. Simply wanting what God wants, with all our thoughts words and deeds in harmony with that. Then everything else will flow into place. And the whole world will know.

This is what we celebrate insofar as we have it, and strive for what we still need to attain.