WORD 2day: Love that prevails

Monday, VI week of Easter: 11th May, 2015

Acts 16: 11-15; Jn 15:26 - 16:4a

Speaking of the new believer in the Lord, a lady of considerable renown, Paul says she prevailed over us! It is true love that prevails, a selfless love inspired by the newly accepted good news! The Lord opened her mind to listen to the Word and her heart to be the consolation for the messengers of the Word. The Lord provides through her.

Today, providing for the messengers of the Word, in ways truly numerous, is one way that we can make love prevail. We may have troubles from every corner, opposition from all sides and forces waiting to devour us - as we say Jesus telling us in the Gospel today. But nothing of this will block us from going ahead in our task and the challenge entrusted to us. The Lord will open minds, inspire hearts and remove blocks, that we may have all the back up needed to take the message far and wide. This has been, or this is at present, my experience too, personally! How many times I would have felt the providence of God, at the exact right moment! Persons coming to my aid, friends pitching in their bit, and so many other unbelievable ways in which the Lord has provided, or numerous ways in which Love has prevailed!

WE ARE CHOSEN

6th Sunday of Easter: 10th May, 2015

Acts 10: 25-26,34-35,44-48; 1 Jn 4:7-10; Jn 15: 9-17

We are Chosen, we are chosen people of God, we are a chosen race: this is a truth that is repeatedly stressed in the Word today. We are given a sign that we are chosen and there is a reason for having been chosen and there is a fruit that is expected of us because we are chosen. Let us understand them one by one.

We are chosen: that needs two clarities. One, we did not choose, but we are chosen! So it is none of our merit that we are within the count of the chosen! If we are here, it is because we are chosen! It not only fills us with a feeling of being special, but it should also fill us with an awe of the inner nature offered unto us. The second clarity is the same as what we said finally here: being chosen is not merely a privilege, but a burden too!

The Sign of being Chosen: Spirit. The sign of being chosen is given in the third person of the Trinity - the Holy Spirit who comes to dwell in us! We become dwelling places of the Spirit, chosen dwelling places of the Spirit (1Cor 3:16 & 6:19). That means our being chosen necessitates two self understandings within us: One, that we are the people of the Spirit and secondly, we belong to God! (1st Reading)

The Reason for being Chosen: Joy. A joy that is complete, is what the Lord wants to offer us. That is the reason for which the Lord has chosen us. A joy that does not fade with time, a joy that does not depend on external conditions and fulfillment of one's desires, a joy that is eternal because the source of it is eternal, timeless: it comes from the Lord! It resides in our hearts and comes from the Spirit who is within; no external conditions can take it away! The Lord fills us with a joy that is not like what the world gives, not like the joy that our possessions give, unlike the joy that our pleasures give... this is the joy that the Lord alone can give! (Gospel Reading)

The Fruit of being Chosen: Love. That you may bear fruit, and bear it abundantly! The fruit is love, the outcome of being chosen is the love that we hold out to every person around us. To love as God loved; without counting the cost, without thinking whether the other deserves it or not; without losing any chance of forgiving and enduring. That is true love and that is the love that we are called to live. (2nd Reading)

We are Chosen... chosen by the Spirit, chosen to be joyful, chosen to love! If we do not love, we do not see the fruits of having been chosen; if we do not have the fruits, it means we do not have the joy of having been chosen; if we do not have the joy of having been chosen, it means we have not allowed the Spirit of the Lord to dwell within us! 

Let us remember! we are the people of the Spirit, we are the Chosen people of God.