Monday, March 27, 2017

Today's readings & meditation



FIRST READING (Isaiah 65:17-21)
Thus says the Lord: “Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth; and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind. But be glad and rejoice for ever in that which I create; for behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy.

“I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and be glad in my people; no more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping and the cry of distress. No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days, or an old man who does not fill out his days, for the child shall die a hundred years old, and the sinner a hundred years old shall be accursed. They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit.”


GOSPEL (John 4:43-54)
Jesus departed to Galilee. For he himself testified that a prophet has no honour in his own country.

So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast, for they too had gone to the feast. So he came again to Cana in Galilee, where he had made the water wine.

And at Capernaum there was an official whose son was ill.When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death.Jesus therefore said to him, “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.”

The official said to him, “Sir, come down before my child dies.”

Jesus said to him, “Go; your son will live.” The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went his way.

As he was going down, his servants met him and told him that his son was living. So he asked them the hour when he began to mend, and they said to him, “Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.”

The father knew that was the hour when Jesus had said to him, “Your son will live”; and he himself believed, and all his household.

This was now the second sign that Jesus did when he had come from Judea to Galilee.


REFLECTIONS
Seeking the Lord with expectant faith - Servants of the Word

Jesus, signs & wonders, and the new creation - Fr Robert Altier

Signs and Wonders Presentation Ministries


FURTHERMORE . . .
“Here was a robust faith [in the case of this official]; therefore, Jesus made him the promise, so that we might learn from this man’s devotion; his faith was as yet imperfect, and he did not clearly realize that Jesus could effect the cure at a distance; thus, the Lord, by not agreeing to go down to the man’s house, wished us to learn the need to have faith”
St.John Chrysostom (c. 347-407) “Homily on St. John”, 35.


Prayer is the soul’s sincere desire,
unuttered or expressed,
the motion of a hidden fire
that trembles in the breast.

Prayer is the burden of a sigh,
the falling of a tear,
the upward glancing of an eye,
when none but God is near.

Prayer is the simplest form of speech
that infant lips can try;
prayer the sublimest strains that reach
the Majesty on high.

Prayer is the Christian’s vital breath,
the Christian’s native air,
our watchword at the gates of death,
we enter heaven with prayer.
James Montgomery (1771-1854)


PRAYER
Teach us, good Lord,
to serve thee as thou deservest;
to give and not to count the cost;
to fight and not to heed the wounds;
to toil, and not to seek for rest;
to labour, and to ask for no reward,
save that of knowing that we do thy will;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

St Ignatius Loyola (1491-1556)


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