REAPING TIME

MERCILENT 2016 - 3rd Sunday in Lent: 28th February

Exo 3: 1-8, 13-15; 1 Cor 10: 1-6, 10-12; Lk 13: 1-9

It's reaping time; it's time to show the difference in my life. If I do not show that difference, that bit of growth that comes from an authentic eagerness towards perfection, I deny myself the possibility of truly experiencing that saving grace of the merciful Father. I have no excuses to make and that is what the readings today establish without doubt.

I have no excuses because, I am accompanied with daily miracles by the Lord. As the Lord accompanied the people of Israel as a cloud and the pillar of fire, the Lord accompanies me with daily miracles in my life. I may or may not recognise the countless miracles that happen all around me but they are constantly there. The daily dose of life, the air that I breathe, the vital sustenance that is ensured...what are these but miracles. The guidance that I receive from daily experiences, the indications that I am given to regulate my life, these are miracles that I keep experiencing from the Lord's accompaniment.

I have no excuses because, I am alerted by regular warnings. Even as I choose to do things that do not really go well with the call that I have received from the Lord, I am warned from within. Even as I see people fumbling and falling, mistaking and missing their way in life, I am given with warnings to change my life, lest I go far far away from the Lord. At times I squander the warnings I receive as I am busy judging people, branding them and writing their destinies unduly. I need to begin to take the cues all around me and be attentive to the warnings that keep coming my way.

I have no excuses because I am affirmed with such abundance of mercy from the Lord. I am given chances after chances, offered countless opportunities and limitless forgiveness from the Lord, that I may grow over my faults and failures, towards making choices that lead me to fruits that show me to be a true son or daughter of God. The Lord invites me to bear fruit, fruits that will show me to be worthy of the image and likeness that I bear; that I may be merciful as the Father. Be ye perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.