24th Sunday after Pentecost 11.11.12 (Readings 5th Sunday after Epiphany)
God is patient but not impotent. We should not mistake His apparent inactivity for approval of human behaviour.
Just because He does not send a lightning bolt every time a sin is committed does not mean He does not notice.
We can be angry with evildoers and want them removed, but better than killing the enemy is to convert him to a friend.
I take no pleasure in the death of a wicked man (Ezekiel 18.23). This is God’s mentality, the way He sees things.
We might be glad to see the wicked man gone but we should have desired his conversion.
This sums up a great deal about the way that God runs the world. He is often accused of being too remote from worldly affairs. If He is a loving God why does this or that disaster happen? He should have stopped it, it is said.
The good are perplexed why they are not rewarded, and the evil not punished.
The main answer is that the evil need to be converted and God’s main plans are focused on that objective.
He asks us to be patient with Him in this project; also to make it our own primary objective.
He also asks us to be patient with any suffering that comes our way; to see it as a sharing in His cross, offering prayer and sacrifice for sinners,
We might start out saying, I don't want to suffer for sinners; all I want is an easy life. But what sort of a disciple is that? If we are disciples of a crucified saviour – how can we escape taking some share of His suffering. And you shall be hated by all men for my name's sake (Luke 21,17)
We cannot expect an armchair ride through life if we are His disciples.
At first we might expect reward and to be spared from suffering, but the more good we are the more it seems to bring on suffering. This is because we become more of a target; a sign that we are true disciples, not just a lazy or negligent ones.
Also if we are good enough disciples we actually will want the conversion of our enemies – they may hate us but we love them.
We are Christian; therefore we are to be like Christ. He did not hate anyone.
We have to learn to think as He does; the spiritual way not the worldly way.
So we have to override our desire for revenge, our desire to see enemies punished, and want them converted instead.
How can we want this? It seems so unnatural; yet it is what Christ is like. Easy for Him, we might say. He is God. But He takes out the heart of stone and gives us a heart of flesh instead (cf Ezekiel 36,26)
To be like Christ we have to be humble too. So we do not go the way of pride but of compassion. We do not see ourselves as better than others; just all in need of mercy.
To help others to be saved. This is one of the two main reasons we are on this earth. The other is to glorify God. We do not want to obstruct things by doing the opposite of what is required.
May the grace of God give us this vision, that we will always remember who we are and what we are here for.
We are not here for a holiday; but to make this place look like the Kingdom of God.
If we do our job well enough there will be no ‘weeds’ at the final harvest.
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