Thursday, November 28, 2019

The final word is the Lord's

WORD 2day: Friday, last week in the Ordinary time

November 29, 2019: Daniel 7:2-14; Luke 21:29-33

Calamities, Persecutions, Demoralisation these are what we see in the case of all those who had to pay with their blood, the price for their faith in Christ. Not just the first Christians or the three centuries of persecution that followed, all through the centuries we have people persecuted for belonging to God. Sadly, we as Christians have persecuted others too...sometimes in arrogance, sometimes in the over zealous stands that we have taken, and sometimes with an insensitive silence in history.

The first reading speaks of all these types of calamities and persecutions, but finishing however with a note of hope on the eternal dominion of the Son of Man. That is the typical outlook of a person of God - to see all that is so evil but all the time to see through them all, the benign face of God.

The Gospel reaffirms the hope presented in the first reading, from the mouth of the very object of that hope: the Word made flesh. In spite of these frightening scenes all around you, be firm that the Lord is still in control, because the final word with always be the Lord's!

Perseverance is a virtue in imitation of the faithfulness of God. 'Let us never grow tired of doing what is right' (2 Thes 3:13), as the Lord himself who never gets tired of loving us! Whatever be our situation, if we are truly persons of God, if we believe that we are children of God in the true sense that we have surrendered ourselves in the hands of the Lord, then let us take a deep breath and say, the final word will always be the Lord's!