29 February 2016 - in the ordinary

that mustache

[ Today's Readings ]

I thought that he would surely come out and stand there
to invoke the LORD his God,
and would move his hand over the spot,
and thus cure the leprosy.

LORD, you want to heal us. Help us to set aside our expectations. Our churches and are homes and our prayer lives have become your native place. What keeps you from healing here? It is our expectations that limit you.

Amen, I say to you,
no prophet is accepted in his own native place.

Things in this native place of yours are just too mundane. How could anything important or groundbreaking happen here? How could there be true progress or healing here?

“My father,” they said,
“if the prophet had told you to do something extraordinary,
would you not have done it?
All the more now, since he said to you,
‘Wash and be clean,’ should you do as he said.”

Help us to look for your presence in our ordinary lives, Jesus. Teach us to find healing even in the sorts of things we have done a million times before. Maybe this mass or this prayer time is the time you offer us the breakthrough we desire. Don't let us miss it.

As the hind longs for the running waters,
so my soul longs for you, O God.

We thirst for you, LORD. But you are here. This is your native place. We want to behold your face. But you constantly send forth your light and your fidelity to us. We spend time regularly on your holy mountain. Help us not to forget this because we are so used to you. Help our expectations not to be set by what we ourselves see and understand. Set them instead by our faith and hope in you. Teach us to say and to believe, "Now I know that there is no God in all the earth, except in Israel."

Then will I go in to the altar of God,
the God of my gladness and joy;
Then will I give you thanks upon the harp,
O God, my God!