Sunday Readings Reflection September 21, 2014 Isaiah 55:6-9 Philippians 1:20-24.27 Matthew 20:1-16 A major theme that is running through the whole of the Old and New Testaments is that of ‘justice’. God is wholly just and we are called, both individually and corporately, to lives of justice. The Readings of today refer to how much the God’s wisdom surpasses our human categories of value and judgment. We experience a desire for God and for communion with others. Human nature has the wonderful capacity to love and to put its necessary self-affirmation at the service of God in communion with others. We also experience within ourselves a profound, but not fatal, distortion of these faculties that exaggerates and distracts these tendencies and inclinations from their true measure and purpose. Each person experiences in a unique way this inner tension and ruptures and experiences, on the one hand, the conflict between fundamental desires for love and justice, and, on the other, the practical difficulty of acting as we would ideally desire. In the first reading prophet Isaiah exhorts his people to search actively for the Lord. He reminds his people that the Lord’s ways are not obvious to us, and need to be sought while we have the opportunity. Paul in the second reading shows us the spirit of true Christian service. He would prefer to be with Christ, but he knows that his present work in the vineyard “is more necessary for your benefit”. He says that for him, to live is Christ and to die is gain. Matthew’s Gospel presents us with a parable that demonstrates to us the difference between our spontaneous judgments and God’s ways. If we do more, like the early laborers in the vineyard, our natural reaction is to claim more for ourselves than the latecomers who do less. The parable reminds us that service in God’s vineyard is selfless. It is God’s will and wisdom to save all who want to work, and that should also be our intention.
Posted on: Sun, 21 Sep 2014 04:08:25 +0000
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