Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Psalm 105 : 19-20, 21-22, 23
They made a calf at Horeb and worshipped the molten image. They exchanged the glory of God for the image of a bull that eats grass.
They forgot their Saviour God, Who had done great things in Egypt, wonderful works in the land of Ham, and awesome deeds by the Sea of Reeds.
So He spoke of destroying them, but Moses, His chosen one, stood in the breach before Him to shield them from destruction.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Exodus 32 : 7-14
Then YHVH said to Moses, “Go down at once, for your people, whom you brought up from the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. They have quickly turned from the way I commanded them and have made for themselves a molten calf; they have bowed down before it and sacrificed to it and said : ‘These are your gods, Israel, who brought you out of Egypt.'”
And YHVH said to Moses, “I see that these people are a stiff-necked people. Now just leave Me that My anger may blaze against them. I will destroy them, but of you I will make a great nation.” But Moses calmed the anger of YHVH, his God, and said, “Why, o YHVH, should Your anger burst against Your people whom You brought out of the land of Egypt with such great power and with a mighty hand?”
“Let not the Egyptians say : ‘YHVH brought them out with evil intent, for He wanted to kill them in the mountains and wipe them from the face of the earth.’ Turn away from the heat of Your anger and do not bring disaster on Your people. Remember Your servants, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and the promise You Yourself swore : I will multiply Your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land I spoke about I will give to them as an everlasting inheritance.”
YHVH then changed His mind and would not yet harm His people.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scripture telling us about our obedience to the will of God, as we heard how Jesus Our Lord obeyed the will of His Father, and delivered to us the words of truth, and the revelation of God’s love and desire for us all, that each one of us may be reconciled with Him in perfect love.
In the first reading, God promised His people that He would send them His salvation, because He would have pity and show mercy to His people, and He would not abandon them to their fated destruction because of their sins. He may hate and despise their sins and wickedness, but ultimately all of them, each and every one of His people, are His beloved ones. God loves us all His children, for if He had not loved us, He would not have created us.
Unfortunately, it was our sins caused by our refusal to obey His laws and commandments that have caused our separation from Him. We were meant and destined to be with God forever, and yet our sins sundered us from Him, and our ancestors were cast out of God’s presence at Eden because of their sins and their surrender to the temptations of the devil in eating the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
Sin is caused by the disobedience of our ancestors, and also our own refusal to listen to God’s will, as He had made it clear to us through His laws, His prophets and messengers, and which He had delivered to us Himself through His Son, Jesus Christ, Our Lord, and then passed on to us through His Apostles and disciples in the Church He established, which we are part of. We sin because we think that it is better to follow our own path, to follow our own thoughts and ways, our preferences and desires rather than to walk in the path that God had set before us.
That is why, in assuming the flesh and form of Man, by being Incarnate and born of His mother, Mary, to be the Son of Man just as He is the Son of God, to be the perfect Man and the role model of obedience for all of us, who have sinned because of our disobedience. As we have disobeyed God and subsequently fell into sin, Jesus showed us how we can be obedient to God, and therefore receive forgiveness for our sins, and be reconciled with God.
All power, authority, glory and honour has been given to Christ, as the Saviour and Liberator of all man, to free them from all bonds of sin and from our fated punishment because of those sins. He alone has the power and authority to deliver us from our sins and from all those punishment, and that is the essence of what we have heard from our Gospel passage today. And yet, God chose to show all these not through mighty deeds and wonders, but through the perfect obedience of Jesus Christ.
He wanted to show all of us that while disobedience has caused us to sin and therefore, to be sundered from God and deserving eternal damnation, but obedience to God following the examples of Christ will bring about a new life, filled with a new grace, grace from God and forgiveness for all the trespasses and faults that we have committed thus far. He chose to show us true obedience, and also His love for each one of us, by willingly taking up all of our intended punishments, our sins and everything we should have suffered from, on His cross and bearing it up to Calvary, where He died for us, so that we who believe in Him may be forgiven and live.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, in this season of Lent, all of us are supposed to prepare ourselves for the coming celebration of Holy Week and Easter, all of which are centred on the saving mission of Christ which He performed through His suffering, death on the cross, and ultimately His resurrection from the dead. Through this act of perfect and selfless love, God showed us that out of all the darkness of sin and all the wickedness, by obeying His laws and commandments, we can be redeemed and enter into the eternal glory of heaven.
And what is it that we must do in order to obey the Law? First of all, we must put God first and foremost in our minds, in all the things we do, and we must love Him with all of our hearts. Then secondly, we must show love, care and concern for our brethren, for our neighbours and all of our fellow men, by our actions and deeds. In fact, when we sin, we put our own ego, our own desires, and our very selves ahead of God, and ahead of others.
There have been many occasions in the history of man, when we have acted selfishly and wickedly, putting our own interests ahead of our obligation to God and to our fellow men. Wars and conflicts have been fought and much destruction wrought just so that some individuals can get whatever it is that they desired and wanted. And when man gained something, as we should be aware of, we cannot be easily satisfied by what we already have, and we end up desiring for more.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, during this season and time of Lent, we are all called to reevaluate and reorientate our lives so that when we were once slaves to sin, and to our desires and greed, we may be able to turn our disobedience and refusal to believe in God and walk in His ways, into obedience like that shown by Christ Our Lord Himself. As Christians, all of us are called so because we believe in Christ. But can we call ourselves Christians if we do not follow the examples Christ had set before us, and do not do what He Himself had done?
The Lord showed compassion and love for the weak and the downtrodden. He cared for the well-being of His people, feeding five thousand men and more women and children in one occasion, and four thousand in another, when He saw them hungry and without sustenance after following Him for days. And when He saw them lost without a guidance, He spent many hours teaching them about God’s truth.
We can see from these examples how Christ put His people ahead of Himself. He ministered to them, obeying the will of His Father with all of His heart and commitment, even if His human existence might be tired, exhausted or hungry. Are we able to do the same as well in our own lives and in our interactions with others? Are we able to act selflessly for the benefit of others and obey God’s commandments like Christ had done?
These are the questions that we need to keep in mind as we continue to journey through the time of Lent. Let us all devote ourselves anew to God, and change our way of life, that from disobedience we turn towards a new obedience and faith to God. Let us be ever more devoted and good servants of God. May the Lord be with us all, now and always. Amen.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
John 5 : 17-30
At that time, Jesus replied to the Jews, “My Father goes on working and so do I.” And the Jews tried all the harder to kill Him, for Jesus not only broke the Sabbath observance, but also made Himself equal with God, calling God His own Father.
Jesus said to them, “Truly, I assure you, the Son cannot do anything by Himself, but only what He sees the Father do. And whatever He does, the Son also does. The Father loves the Son and shows Him everything He does; and He will show Him even greater things than these, so that you will be amazed.”
“As the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son gives life to whom He wills. In the same way the Father judges no one, for He has entrusted all judgment to the Son, and He wants all to honour the Son as they honour the Father. Whoever ignores the Son, ignores as well the Father Who sent Him.”
“Truly, I say to you, anyone who hears My word and believes Him Who sent Me, has eternal life; and there is no judgment for him, because he has passed from death to life. Truly, the hour is coming and has indeed come, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and, on hearing it, will live. For the Father has life in Himself, and He has given to the Son also to have life in Himself. And He has empowered Him as well to carry out Judgment, for He is Son of Man.”
“Do not be surprised at this : the hour is coming when all those lying in tombs will hear My voice and come out; those who have done good shall rise to live, and those who have done evil will rise to be condemned. I can do nothing of Myself, and I need to hear Another One to judge; and My judgment is just, because I seek not My own will, but the will of Him Who sent Me.”
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Psalm 144 : 8-9, 13cd-14, 17-18
Compassionate and gracious is the Lord, slow to anger and abounding in love. The Lord is good to everyone; His mercy embraces all His creation.
The Lord is true to His promises and lets His mercy show in all He does. The Lord lifts up those who are falling and raises those who are beaten down.
Righteous is the Lord in all His ways, His mercy shows in all His deeds. He is near those who call on Him, who call trustfully upon His Name.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Isaiah 49 : 8-15
This is what YHVH says : “At a favourable time I have answered you, on the day of salvation I have been your help; I have formed you and made you to be My covenant with the people. You will restore the land, and allot its abandoned farms. You will say to the captives : Come out; and to those in darkness : Show yourselves.”
“They will feed along the road; they will find pasture on barren hills. They will neither hunger nor thirst, nor will the scorching wind or the sun beat upon them; for He Who has mercy on them will guide them and lead them to springs of water. I will turn all My mountains into roads and raise up My highways. See, they come from afar, some from the north and west, others from the land of Sinim.”
Sing, o heavens and rejoice, o earth; break forth into song, o mountains : for YHVH has comforted His people and taken pity on those who are afflicted. But Zion said : “YHVH has forsaken me, my Lord has forgotten me.” Can a woman forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child of her womb? Yet though she forget, I will never forget you.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, in today’s Scripture readings, we heard interesting stories which relate to us about water, firstly the vision of the prophet Ezekiel of the heavenly Temple, out of which flowed out great quantity of water that flooded the courtyards, and which overflowed its banks and gave life to all the plants and living things it passes by. Then in the Gospel today we heard about how the Lord Jesus healed a man who had been waiting for many years for miraculous healing to come from the water at Bethzatha pool.
In these two readings, we see the clear parallel and similarity, in water depicted as life-giving and nourishing, as the source of healing and life. And this is very symbolic, if we understand better the meaning and the nuances behind the two readings today. The Temple in heaven as seen in the vision of the prophet Ezekiel represent none other than the Holy Presence of God Himself, and the water that gushed forth from the Temple represents God giving life to the world.
In the Gospel passage, as we heard the story of the man who was paralysed for thirty-eight years and had no one to help him to get into the water, we saw that the source of all healing came not from the water, as God sent His Angel to touch the water of the spring, and the people who touched the water were therefore healed by God’s grace. The man who had none to help him for so many years, was truly hoping that he could get healed from his illness, but the Lord heard him and had pity on him.
Jesus touched the paralytic man and almost immediately the man was healed, showing that God once again exercised His power and authority to heal His beloved people, who were sick, both in body and also in soul. Why is this so? That is because Jesus came into this world, ultimately to reconcile all the people of God who have been separated from God because of their sins.
Sin is a terrible affliction upon all of us, caused by our refusal to listen to God and to obey Him, and by our disobedience, sin entered into our hearts, our minds and corrupted everything, eating away on our souls. We may think that we are physically healthy and perfectly in good physical condition. We may think that there is nothing wrong with us, because superficially we look perfectly fine.
However, due to sin, in our beings and existences, we have been spoiled and corrupted, and we have been sickened by these sins which afflicted us. Worse still, many of us are not aware that sin is a great danger on our souls, and that we really need to do something about it, or else, we may end up being punished with eternal damnation because of our sins.
And unlike any physical and worldly illnesses, diseases and infections, which can be cured through various means, or had their effects reduced or halted or postponed, the consequences of sin is not curable by any worldly and human means, no matter how hard we try, because sin is only curable by God, through His forgiveness and mercy, which in fact, He generously offered to all of us, calling us to a renewed existence and new life, no longer living in a state of sin, but filled instead with resolve and commitment to repent and turn away from those sins.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, in our own lives, surely many of us have been tempted to live our lives in accordance with what we want and what our desires tell us to do. However, if we take a step back and think carefully about it, we will realise that if we are to trust in our own strength, intellect and assumptions, we will not be able to survive as we put our trust in human strength and power that can fail anytime.
And our desires, our ego and pride will only lead us to slide down ever further into the trap of sin, which the devil springs against us all, every single time he could do so, so that we fall from our path towards God’s salvation. Satan does this by feeding our ego, our sense of self-importance and edging on our selfish nature. But certainly God did not remain quiet or ignorant of these vicious attacks constantly targeting us, His people.
That is why through Jesus Christ, His Son, Whom He sent into the world in order to save all of us, God has shown His salvation and healing grace to all mankind. Now, it is up to us whether we are willing to accept this generous and rich offer of mercy and forgiveness, healing and reconciliation. God extends His forgiveness freely to us, but He also requires each one of us to be committed to be forgiven, that is by active repentance and genuine regret for all the sins and faults we have made.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, all of us are sinners, but do we want to remain living in sin? If we are willing to commit to change ourselves, even the greatest of sinners can become great saints, as what had exactly happened before. All saints were once sinners too, some with small sins, some with great ones. But all of them share the same conviction and resolve to follow through with their repentance, and as a result, they receive forgiveness for their sins.
Let us all spend the rest of this season of Lent wisely, making use of the opportunity given to us by God to turn ourselves wholeheartedly towards Him. Let us no longer be stubborn in refusing His generous offer of mercy, but instead renew our commitment to live in accordance with His will. May God be with us always, and may He continue to guide us in the path He is leading us through, towards His salvation and the promise of eternal life. Amen.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
John 5 : 1-16
At that time, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now, by the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem, there is a pool (called Bethzatha in Hebrew) surrounded by five galleries. In these galleries lay a multitude of sick people : blind, lame and paralysed.
(All were waiting for the water to move, for at times an Angel of the Lord would descend into the pool and stir up the water; and the first person to enter the pool, after this movement of the water, would be healed of whatever disease that he had.)
There was a man who had been sick for thirty-eight years. Jesus saw him, and because He knew how long this man had been lying there, He said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” And the sick man answered, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is disturbed; so while I am still on my way, another steps down before me.”
Jesus then said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk!” And at once the man was healed, and he took up his mat and walked. Now that day happened to be the Sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who had just been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and the Law does not allow you to carry your mat.” He answered them, “The One Who healed me said to me, “Take up your mat and walk!”
They asked him, “Who is the One Who said to you : Take up your mat and walk?” But the sick man had no idea who it was Who had cured him, for Jesus had slipped away among the crowd that filled the place. Afterwards Jesus met him in the Temple court and told him, “Now you are well; do not sin again, lest something worse happen to you.”
And the man went back and told the Jews that it was Jesus Who had healed him. So the Jews persecuted Jesus because He performs healings like that on the Sabbath.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Psalm 45 : 2-3, 5-6, 8-9ab
God is our strength and protection, an ever-present help in affliction. We will not fear, therefore, though the earth be shaken and the mountains plunge into the seas.
There is a river whose streams bring joy to the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells. God is within, the city cannot quake, for God’s help is upon it at the break of day.
For with us is the Lord of hosts, the God of Jacob, our refuge. Come, see the works of the Lord – the marvellous things He has done in the world.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Ezekiel 47 : 1-9, 12
The man brought me back to the entrance of the Temple and I saw water coming out from the threshold of the Temple and flowing eastwards. The Temple faced the east and the water flowed from the south side of the Temple, from the south side of the altar. He then brought me out through the north gate and led me around the outside to the outer gate facing the east and there I saw the stream coming from the south side.
The man had a measuring cord in his hand. As he went towards the east he measured off a thousand cubits and led me across the water which was up to my ankles. He measured off another thousand cubits and made me cross the water which came to my knees. He measured off another thousand cubits and we crossed the water which was up to my waist. When he had again measured a thousand cubits, I could not cross the torrent for it had swollen to a depth which was impossible to cross without swimming.
The man then said to me, “Son of man, did you see?” He led me on further and then brought me back to the bank of the river. There I saw a number of trees on both sides of the river. He said to me, “This water goes to the east, down to the Arabah, and when it flows into the sea of foul-smelling water, the water will become wholesome.”
“Wherever the river flows, swarms of creatures will live in it; fish will be plentiful and the sea water will become fresh. Wherever it flows, life will abound. Near the river on both banks there will be all kinds of fruit trees with foliage that will not wither and fruit that will never fail; each month they will bear a fresh crop because the water comes from the Temple. The fruit will be good to eat and the leaves will be used for healing.”
petercanisiusmichaeldavidkang 