Our choices punish us, not God!

WORD 2day: Monday, 13th week in Ordinary time

June 28, 2021: Genesis 18: 16-33; Matthew 8: 18-22

The first reading today is a bit confusing! It presents a scene which looks as if God is waiting to destroy some cities and Abraham is trying to appease the wrath of God. Though apparently that is how it is narrated, the message communicated is quite different. Apart from an important learning from today's Word, there is an important unlearning that has to happen. 

Sodom and Gomorrah were cities filled with filth and sinfulness, wickedness and devilishness and on account of these, they were cities that were running themselves into destruction! It is like the ecological crisis and the nuclear risks that we have created for ourselves today! Anything goes wrong anywhere, it is going to affect a large section of humanity. One day or the other we are to reap its fruits! We already are facing the brunt of such foolishness, with the pandemic that is draining the life out of  us these days!

The Wisdom of God in warning against these kind of craziness and pointing the right way is either rejected or belittled. The natural law and the divine law that is imprinted on our spirits, is the only guarantee towards a peaceful life. But we have ruined our prospects, disrespecting and discarding any law that comes from God! 

When Jesus discourages one from following him and chides the other for not following him, he knows exactly what is good for each of them. God has set laws and order, keeping in mind the needs, wants and requirements for peaceful living of the entire humanity. In human pride, irrational greed and ruthless selfishness, we have made a mess of the world entrusted to us. The warning is to all of us today, if we do not mend our ways and return to the ways of the Lord, we are leading ourselves and our world into destruction. As he did with Abraham, the Lord is negotiating with and through every good willed person even today!

Now coming to the learning and the unlearning: to learn the laws of the Lord inscribed on our hearts; to unlearn any misunderstanding that God punishes or God destroys! God does not punish, our own choices do!