Liturgical Colour : White
Psalm 23 : 1-2, 3-4ab, 5-6
The earth and its fullness belong to the Lord, the world and all that dwell in it. He has founded it upon the ocean and set it firmly upon the waters.
Who will ascend the mountain of the Lord? Who will stand in His holy place? Those with clean hands and pure heart, who desire not what is vain.
They will receive blessings from the Lord, a reward from God, their Saviour. Such are the people who seek Him, who seek the face of Jacob’s God.
Liturgical Colour : White
Revelations 7 : 2-4, 9-14
I saw another Angel ascending from the sunrise, carrying the seal of the living God, and he cried out with a loud voice to the four Angels empowered to harm the earth and the sea, “Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees until we have sealed the servants of our God upon their foreheads.”
Then I heard the number of those marked with the seal : a hundred and forty-four thousand from all the tribes of the people of Israel. After this I saw a great crowd, impossible to count, from every nation, race, people and tongue, standing before the throne and the Lamb, clothed in white, with palm branches in their hands, and they cried out with a loud voice, “Who saves but our God Who sits on the throne and the Lamb?”
All the Angels were around the throne, the elders and the four living creatures; they then bowed before the throne with their faces to the ground to worship God. They said, “Amen. Praise, glory, wisdom, thanks, honour, power and strength to our God forever and ever. Amen!”
At that moment, one of the elders spoke up and said to me, “Who are these people clothed in white, and where did they come from?” I answered, “Sir, it is you who know this.” The elder replied, “They are those who have come out of the great persecution; they have washed and made their clothes white in the Blood of the Lamb.”
Liturgical Colour : Green
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we are reminded through the Sacred Scriptures, by the words of our Lord Himself, that we ought to show love, care and concern for our brethren, particularly those who are lacking in sustenance, care and love. We should not ignore the plight of those who hunger, those who are suffering the daily effects of worldly sufferings.
Those who have more should be willing to come to the aid of those who lack, and when we have an abundance of love and good things, we should not forget all those who are less fortunate than us. This is the reality of our world, one that we should realise and appreciate, that we should not forget that in all of the blessings we have enjoyed in this world, there is always inequality in this world, and some others are perhaps suffering while we enjoy ourselves.
It does not mean then that we should not rejoice or be sorrowful or also seek to suffer. That is not what God had intended for us. Instead, as He had made it clear through today’s passage, that He wants each and every one of us to be filled with joy, that no one should suffer without help, and no joy should be excluded from others who should rejoice together with us.
It is what our Lord wants from all of us who call ourselves and who are indeed Christians. He wants all of us to share the love we have, the joy we have, for we have been united and made into one Body, the Body of Christ, the Church, and as members of the same Body, all of us who have been made the sons and daughters of our Lord ought to share that joy and blessings we have received from our Father and share the sorrow and joy we have with each other.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, thus we are called to recall what is our purpose and what is our objective as we live our lives as Christians. Are we devoted to the Lord, by loving Him and showing our obedience, walking in His path and doing what is right and just in His sight? And by doing this, does it mean that we have cared and showed care and concern for our brethren, particularly those whom we have seen to suffer from the effects of the suffering of this world?
Otherwise, if we have not done all of these, we are empty in our faith, in our faith life. After all, we cannot be truly faithful to God, if we profess to have such faith, and yet our words, actions and or deeds speak otherwise. Indeed, we may become hypocrites in our faith, and God will not look kindly on that. If we have not loved others and showed them our attention, if they need us, then are we true disciples of our Lord?
After all, God Himself had shown us all so much love, from the greatest of sinners to the greatest of the saints and the righteous ones. He had willingly come down into this world, and taking up our flesh and form, He had endeavoured to take up upon Himself the seemingly impossible task of ensuring our salvation from all of our sins. He has bore that cross and endured all the sufferings, out of the great love He has for us, even for His enemies and all those who had called upon and plotted for His death.
He has shown us all a perfect example, and should we all not follow Him then? He has called upon us all to be generous with our love and not to withhold our compassion and mercy from those who seek them. Therefore, as Christians, we should all come to realise and indeed commit ourselves to love one another, show forgiveness and mercy to those who have wronged us, and show the love of God to all those who have been unloved.
May God bless our works of charity and awaken in us a generous and loving heart filled with care and concern for our brethren, in the same way that He Himself had loved us from the beginning of time to now and to forevermore. Amen.
Liturgical Colour : Green
Luke 14 : 12-14
At that time, Jesus also addressed the man who had invited Him, and said, “When you give a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends, or your brothers and relatives, or your wealthy neighbours. For surely they will also invite you in return, and you will be repaid.”
“When you give a feast, invite instead the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind. Fortunate are you then, because they cannot repay you; you will be repaid at the resurrection of the upright.”
Liturgical Colour : Green
Psalm 130 : 1, 2, 3
O Lord, my heart is not proud nor do I have arrogant eyes. I am not engrossed in ambitious matters, nor in things too great for me.
I have quieted and stilled my soul like a weaned child on its mother’s lap; like a contented child is my soul.
Hope in the Lord, o Israel, now and forever.
Liturgical Colour : Green
Philippians 2 : 1-4
If I may advise you in the Name of Christ and if you can hear it as the voice of love; if we share the same Spirit and are capable of mercy and compassion, then I beg of you, make me very happy : have one love, one Spirit, one feeling, do nothing through rivalry or vain conceit.
On the contrary let each of you gently consider the others as more important than yourselves. Do not seek your own interest, but rather that of others.
Liturgical Colour : Green
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we heard that well known story of Jesus and Zaccheus, one of the stories that many of us must have heard while we were having our catechism classes, where we heard about how Zaccheus, the rich tax collector but a short man, desired to see Jesus and endeavoured to climb a tree just so that he could see Him, and for that, the Lord rewarded him with the privilege of Him coming to his house to eat with him and the other tax collectors.
And through that story, we heard the loving kindness, compassion and mercy of our Lord, Who loves each and every one of us equally, from the greatest of sinners to the greatest of the virtuous and righteous ones. God showed us all His love and mercy even though we have disobeyed Him and have been rebellious and delinquent in our ways. It is His desire that we are able to find our way to His loving mercy and be forgiven for our trespasses and sins.
That is the essence of our Gospel passage today, as well as some other stories of Jesus’ works, where He showed mercy to the woman caught in adultery, whom the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law wanted to stone to death. And that is also what He told His disciples when He related to them the parable of the prodigal son, telling them about a son who have disobeyed his father, and following his own desires, committed wicked lifestyle and eventually after having suffered, decided to repent and return to the house of his father, and the father accepted him back with love.
All of these showed to us the infinite mercy of our Lord, how great an extent He is willing to go in order to regain us back, all of us who have been sundered from Him because of our iniquities and sins, which resulted in our estrangement and fall into sin. But at the same time, as was the case when Jesus forgave the woman caught committing adultery, He told her not to sin anymore and go in peace from then on.
This is a reminder for us that while God’s mercy is given to us freely and unconditionally, but whether we will receive the fullness of His love and mercy depends solely on our desire to be forgiven, that is through genuine repentance and desire to change ourselves. No mercy and forgiveness can take place without repentance just as much as we cannot clap using only one hand. We have to have mercy and repentance working in tandem and only then we will be shown mercy and forgiveness.
After all, let us look at the examples of the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, the scribes, elders and the chief priests themselves. God came into this world not just to save the prostitutes, tax collectors and all considered as sinners, since it is one misconception that can easily be made when we read today’s Gospel and other passages from the Sacred Scriptures.
Rather, God came to save all, be it those who are righteous or those considered as sinners, or those who have high and noble birth, and those who have low and common birth. He does not look at appearances, status or other worldly classifications of ourselves, but instead, He is looking deep into our hearts in order to see if we are truly worthy of His salvation.
Jesus forgave His enemies and those who have made Him to suffer from the cross, by saying to God His Father, ‘Father, do not hold this sin against them, for they do not know what they are doing.’ And through these words we can see that even Jesus came to deliver these people from their sins, and showed mercy as well as compassion to them, instead of cursing them and being angry with them. Now then the question is, did they take up His offer of mercy? Did they change their ways and repent? Or did they go on with their lives as how it was?
Therefore, we can see here that while God came for all of His people, to the Pharisees, to the tax collectors, to the chief priests, to the prostitutes, to people big and small in statures and status in the society, to those who have good appearances and bad appearances, all ultimately depend on their acceptance of that mercy and forgiveness.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, the same applies to us as well. We have lots of opportunities given to us by God to be redeemed and to be forgiven our sins in this life we are now enjoying in this earth. However, are we doing something in order to accept that salvation offered freely to us and do what is required of us? As Christians, all of us have been accepted by God to be members of His own Sacred Body, the Church, and we have been brought into one people, to be God’s own chosen ones, and be cleansed of the taints of original sins of our ancestors, but this does not mean that we can be complacent.
In fact, there are many Christians out there who are complacent and lukewarm in their faith, thinking that they are justified on the account of their faith alone, but then let me ask you, ‘What is faith?’ There may be many among us who do not really know or understand what is faith truly about, that is what is our faith is about. Can we truly say that we believe in God if we do not even act in the way that our faith requires of us, and which our Lord had taught us through His Church?
Just as Jesus Himself said, that not all who said ‘Lord, Lord’ will be saved, and also all who claimed to know Him and have indeed sat with Him and knew Him will be saved, just because they did not do as He had commanded them to do, and rather than doing what is good in the sight of God, through their wickedness and evil, they have besmirched and stained the good Name of the Lord in the sight of many people.
Yes, brothers and sisters in Christ, our faith requires active participation in good works and commitment to love, loving our brethren and showing our faith through true and living commitment in our words, actions and deeds, that we then shall be found just and worthy by the Lord, Who will then welcome us into His promise of eternal life, true joy and glory with Him in His heavenly kingdom, where we shall enjoy forever the joy of everlasting life without end.
But all of these, as mentioned earlier today, requires us to devote ourselves to do what is good and righteous before God, shunning evil and repenting from our sins. All of us are sinners, and all of us have disobeyed the Lord in one way or another, but that does not mean that any of us are beyond God’s salvation or hope. As long as we are still alive in this world, and desiring for a complete change of our own sinful life, there is always hope for us.
That is where we as Christians should contribute to the good works of our Lord’s salvation. There are many out there who have given up the hope of God’s salvation, and even many more who are still living in darkness and in ignorance of God’s truth and salvation. It is up to us then to help them, and to guide them that they may find their way to the Lord and thus be saved.
And as such, shall we not, brethren, commit ourselves anew to do the will of God and to obey Him in all things? And as St. Francis of Assisi was famous through his prayer, let us also pray it together, that when there is hatred, let us all sow love, and when there is injury, let us pardon, when there is doubt, let us all bring faith, when there is despair, let us all bring hope to each other, and when there is darkness, let us be light to one another, and finally when there is sadness and sorrow, let us bring joy to each other.
May God help us all to become better Christians and role model for one another, that in all the things we do and say, we always proclaim the Lord’s glory and be ever faithful to His ways and commandments, by showing mercy to sinners, and by seeking genuine repentance and regretting sincerely all of our sins, that all of us may eventually find our way to the Lord. God bless us all. Amen.
Liturgical Colour : Green
Luke 19 : 1-10
At that time, when Jesus entered Jericho and passed through the city, a man named Zaccheus lived there. He was a tax collector and a wealthy man. He wanted to see what Jesus was like, but he was a short man and could not see Him because of the crowd.
So he ran ahead and climbed up a sycamore tree. From there he would be able to see Jesus, Who was going to pass that way. When Jesus came to the place, He looked up and said to him, “Zaccheus, Zaccheus, come down quickly, for I must stay at your house today.” So Zaccheus climbed down and received Him joyfully.
All the people who saw it began to grumble, and said, “He has gone as a guest to the house of a sinner.” But Zaccheus spoke to Jesus, “Half of what I own, Lord, I will give to the poor, and if I have cheated anyone, I will pay him back four times as much.”
Looking at him Jesus said, “Salvation has come to this house today, for he is also a true son of Abraham. The Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost.”
Liturgical Colour : Green
2 Thessalonians 1 : 11 – 2 Thessalonians 2 : 2
This is why we constantly pray for you; may our God make you worthy of His calling. May He, by His power, fulfil your good purposes and your work prompted by faith. In that way, the Name of Jesus our Lord will be glorified through you, and you through Him, according to the loving plan of God and of Christ Jesus the Lord.
Brothers and sisters, let us speak about the coming of Christ Jesus, our Lord, and our gathering to meet Him. Do not be easily unsettled. Do not be alarmed by what a prophet says or by any report, or by some letter said to be ours, saying the day of the Lord is at hand.
Liturgical Colour : Green
Psalm 144 : 1-2, 8-9, 10-11, 13cd-14
I will extol You, my God and King; I will bless Your Name forever. I will praise You day after day and exalt Your Name forever.
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.
All Your works will give You thanks; all Your saints, o Lord, will praise You. They will tell of the glory of Your kingdom and speak of Your power.
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.
petercanisiusmichaeldavidkang 