Daily Reflection for Monday, September 21, 2020
Peace and Blessings, Friends and Parishioners,
We encourage you to reflect on Monday’s readings at this link:
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/092120.cfm
If you prefer to use your own Bible, the readings are:
First Reading: Ephesians 4:1-7, 11-13
Responsorial: Psalm: 19:2-5
Gospel: Matthew 9:9-13
Our reflection on Monday’s reading:
“I, prisoner for the Lord, urge you to live in a manner worthy of the call you have received, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another through love… Ephesians 4:1-2
Though Saint Paul was addressing evangelists, pastors, prophets and teachers of his day “to live in a manner worthy of their call,” those words are as important for me today as they were when he wrote them almost 2000 years ago. If you do nothing else today, sit with the words in the first reading. Let them soak deep in your heart and change you. This is a call for me to explore the grace that God has given me. Am I a good steward of the grace bestowed on me by God?
In the gospel, Christ calls Matthew into service not because of who he is or what he currently does. Christ sees Matthew’s future potential. When the Pharisees question the disciples why Jesus chooses sinners over the righteous, Jesus makes clear that his mission is to call the sinner not the righteous for “those who are well do not need a physician but the sick do” (Matthew 9:12). Today, we celebrate the feast day of St. Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist. I dare say that Matthew used his potential to change the world first by saying “yes” to following Jesus and then evangelizing Christ to others.
Can we see as Jesus sees? What if we practice seeing the potential in others rather than their faults? Each day we awake to a new day of pure potential. We can use this potential to make the world a little better or a little worse. My experience has been that if I use my potential for myself then the effect on the world is very small. However, if my potential is divinely guided and rooted in otherness, then the effects on the world are multiplied.
What do you see as “the grace given to [you] according to the measure of Christ’s gift” (Ephesians 14:7)? How will you leverage that gift for “building up the body of Christ” (Ephesians 14:12)?
May we all seek the extreme potential that each of us has been gifted by God and use it to share Christ with others.
May Christ’s peace be with you all,
Paul Gunn