THE LORD IS COMPASSION AND LOVE
A Happy & Blessed 3rd Sunday of Lent. How have your Lenten disciplines been progressing so far? It’s a good time for us at this juncture to do an honest self-assessment & then course-correct & move forward in our Lenten journey, to fully receive the graces of conversion & renewal.
For the RCIA, these next 3 weeks (3rd Sunday of Lent till 5th Sunday of Lent) are a critical point in the journey of the Elect (no longer called Catechumens) towards baptism at Easter. We will celebrate the Rite of Scrutiny of the Elect these 3 weeks & invite you to pray for them. Meantime, it’ll be also a great opportunity for us this Lent to ask the Lord to scrutinize Our minds & hearts (cf Psalm 139:14 – “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my thoughts.”
I had previously written on the readings for this 1st Scrutiny (from Year A of the 3rd Sunday of Lent) here, if you would like to read more:
LIVING WATER — Church of the Holy Family
Our readings this week (from Year C) show clearly to us that the Lord is a compassionate & loving God. In our 1st reading from Exodus 3:1-9,13-15, God reveals himself to Moses as the God of Abraham, Isaac & Jacob; he shows His love & mercy for the Israelites & declares His intention to set His chosen people free from their state of misery due to the 450 years of slavery in Egypt & bring them into the land He had promised their fathers. God chose Moses to deliver His people. And God revealed His Holy Name to be invoked for all generations – “I Am who I Am.”
In a later chapter in Exodus 34:6-7, on Mount Sinai, the Lord revealed His nature to Moses: “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the parents upon the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.”
St John Chrysostom, in the 2nd Reading of the Office of Readings Monday in the 2nd Week of Lent gives us this wonderful insight into the abundant mercy & love of Father God & Jesus Christ our Lord: “The Israelites witnessed marvels; you also will witness marvels, greater and more splendid than those which accompanied them on their departure from Egypt. You did not see Pharaoh drowned with his armies, but you have seen the devil with his weapons overcome by the waters of baptism. The Israelites passed through the sea; you have passed from death to life. They were delivered from the Egyptians; you have been delivered from the powers of darkness. The Israelites were freed from slavery to a pagan people; you have been freed from the much greater slavery to sin.”
St Paul in today’s 2nd Reading from 1 Corinthians 10:1-6,10-12 also makes reference to the great mercy that God showed the Israelites by letting them pass through the sea & partake of the spiritual food & drink from the spiritual rock, Jesus Christ.
And in our Gospel today from Luke 13:1-9, Jesus’s parable of the owner of the vineyard allowing the fig tree more time to bear fruit instead of immediately cutting it down shows God’s mercy & patience for many who sin against His love, take His blessings & gifts for granted & fail to produce fruit. He gives us more chances. But a warning here for us all this Lent – let’s not be too presumptuous & take God’s mercy & patience for granted. Let’s repent, be reconciled to God & change our lives!
In His great love for us, Jesus reaches out to us & offers us the opportunity to repent, much like how He gave the Samaritan Woman in the Year A Gospel the grace of repentance, conversion & a renewed meaning & purpose in life. What is our response to His invitation? The question I had posed in last year’s reflection remains relevant. Are you willing, like the Samaritan woman, to ‘leave your water jar’ (past & old life) behind? To repent, be converted & change your life? To say ‘Never Again!’ to sin & instead to say ‘Jesus, I believe in You, I trust in You!’? And to share with others how Jesus has healed & saved you?
Let’s end this reflection by declaring with faith our Response in the Psalm from Psalm 103:8 – “The Lord is compassion and love.”
Article by Damian Boon, HFC Blog Team Lead