[ Today's Readings ]
all the people were hanging on his words.
They were hanging on his words because his promises are so good.
How sweet to my taste is your promise!
Did the chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people not sense this? Or was it rather that they had some sense that these promises would turn sour in their stomach? Jesus promises the Kingdom but the leaders of the people are already invested in their own kingdoms. They sense the threat in the words of Jesus. He promises life, joy, and peace in fullness. But only those willing to die to self and live for him can receive it.
There is a sourness to the promises of Jesus insofar as we live in the flesh. That earthly part of us rebels against the idea of surrendering our pride and our egos. But the initial sweetness of the promise is what we need to trust. The sourness is temporary. The sweetness is but a glimpse of how good the fulfillment will be. In some ways, the initial sweetness is the sugar the helps us to take the medicine. The actual healing process has its pain. But the eventual result is better than the condition from which we started. It is better even than the initial sweetness of the medicine would suggest.
Let us allow Jesus to drive from our hearts all of the things we choose instead of God. Then his house can be a house of prayer for us. We can come and receive the healing medicine he has for us. If we do we begin to taste the fullness of life, joy, and peace that he has for us even now. We become steadfast, able to share this promise with others even in tough times like ours.
Then someone said to me, “You must prophesy again
about many peoples, nations, tongues, and kings.”
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