FRIDAY OF WEEK TWELVE IN ORDINARY TIME - 2023

DAILY HOLY MASS READINGS

He took our sicknesses away,
and carried our diseases for us. MT 8:17

GENESIS 17:1,9-10,15-22 ©

My Soul's Beloved,

You chose Abraham. You called him out from where he was and You lead him to the place that You had chosen for him and there God intended to make of his descendants a great nation, a people set apart. He desired to be their God and they were to be His people. 

This was the plan of God to give him descendants as many as the stars and the grains of sand on the shore through his son. But many years passed Abraham turned 100 years old and his wife Sarah was 90 and God's promise remained unfulfilled. Abraham believed it to be impossible for his wife to bear a child and thought it better if God chose his son Ishmael, born of a slave, to be the heir of God's promise. 

We are no different from Abraham - we become restless and impatient when You take Your time in fulfilling Your promises to us. We want to hurry You along. We want You to change Your mind and embrace our plans instead. However, wisdom teaches us that it is better to wait in faith patiently for God to act in His time knowing that for God nothing is impossible.

The first Covenant between God and His people was the circumcision of all males. This was to be the sign that they were marked for God. Sarah did conceive, she did bear a son whom they Isaac and all God's promises were fulfilled. However, all the Covenants made in the past were but a foreshadowing of the New and Final Covenant that God was to make with His New People. The old rejected Him and so He called out of darkness into His own marvelous Light His own Beloved Son, You, His First Born and He made You the Covenant of Love between Himself and the new people of God. Thank You, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

PSALM 127(128):1-5 ©

Indeed the man shall be blessed, the man who fears the Lord.

Your wife will be like a fruitful vine

in the heart of your house;
your children like shoots of the olive,
around your table.

Your promises are true. I believe. Thank You, Lord.

MATTHEW 8:1-4 ©

My Soul's Beloved,

Often O Lord, when sorrow crushes my soul, my anxieties overwhelm me, when I am sad and all within me is darkness I cry out to You every waking moment just like the leper in today's Gospel did. I weep copious tears, fall prostrate before You begging You hoping that You will look at me with pity and compassion, take note of my affliction, and be moved to help me.

‘Sir,’ he said ‘if you want to, you can cure me.’ And Your response to the leper as well as to me is the same. You stretch out Your hand, You touch me as You touched him and You say to me as You said to him, ‘Of course I want to! Be cured!’ And his leprosy was cured at once. So too You heal me. You come to my assistance, even when I foolishly pray that You follow my agenda, my time frame, and answer me in the manner that I desire. You tenderly and compassionately teach me that it is better for me to wait trustingly on You. And while I wait You work marvels in my life answering my prayers in ways that I never thought possible and teaching me once again that You are God and You love me and that You desire only all that is good for me. Thank You, Lord, for always being so exceedingly patient with me.