1 John 3:13-18
Psalms 116:10-13, 16-17
John 15:12-17
When he began the accounting,
a debtor was brought before him who owed him a huge amount.
We owe so much to our God. Even before we factor in the passion of Jesus we owe him more than we can fathom. He creates everything from nothing. Nothing exists because it deserves to exist. It exists because God loves it into existence. So we see the debt we owe to him is already insurmountable. But for somehow, with incomprehensible love, Jesus takes on flesh so that he can suffer and die for us. We owe him more than we can ever fully appreciate let alone repay.
But when we do begin to appreciate how much we are loved we are empowered to love others with the same love which we receive. When we realize how much we have been forgiven we won't hold back forgiveness from our brothers and sisters.
His master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant!
I forgave you your entire debt because you begged me to.
Should you not have had pity on your fellow servant,
as I had pity on you?’
Are we as gratefully as we ought to be? Clearly not. Yet many of us mitigate the words of Jesus at first. We think we haven't done anything 'that bad.' We haven't killed anybody, OK? We're no Hitler or Stalin. We've been forgiven, what, little white lies? Is that, then, all we can muster ourselves to forgive in others? Or when we forgive others greater faults do we think ourselves superior? We are perhaps failing to be thankful for the mercy which keeps us from sin when we do choose the good. We are possibly also not realizing the deep-seated idolatry in our own hearts that chooses self over others. Let us rejoice in mercy even as another who never did anything 'that bad' rejoices. Therese of Lisieux sets a great example: "Make it clear, Mother, that if I had committed all possible crimes, I would still have the same confidence. I would feel that this multitude of offenses would be like a drop of water cast into a blazing fire".
If we truly appreciate this mercy we won't hold it back from others. If we truly value what we have from God we will have the grace to even offer our very lives for others as Maximilian Kolbe does. He loves others even as Jesus loves him. He lays down his life for his friends (cf. Joh. 15:13-14). He is not one who can see his brother in need and yet close his heart against him. He loves not just "in word or speech but in deed and in truth" (cf. 1 Joh. 3:17-18).
Then we can be signs of God's love for the world. Just as Ezekiel is made to be a sign of the coming exile...
I am a sign for you:
as I have done, so shall it be done to them;
as captives they shall go into exile.
...so we become a sign of the return from the even more profound exile. We reveal that on the far side of the exile of death is the paradise of the New Eden, heaven itself. We do this when we reveal in our own lives that there really is a love stronger than death.
The main lesson? "Do not forget the works of the Lord!" If we remember them we are empowered! This is how we forgive, not just "in word or speech" but from the heart. Sharing in this love we prove to the world that our exile does not have to be forever. One day we can hope to say:
O LORD, I am thy servant; I am thy servant, the son of thy handmaid. Thou hast loosed my bonds.
No comments:
Post a Comment