I have been reflecting on the Gospel Readings from the Daily Office, Year One Readings, as posted at www.missionstclare.com
Today’s Gospel Reading is Luke 1:39-48 and the verse that stood out to me is this:
And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the…..
The full passage is Matthew 3:1-12.
It seems we sometimes prefer to think that some of us are wheat and some of us are chaff. But if we are honest, we all have a little chaff on our souls.
When John was talking to the Pharisees and Sadducees he mentions ‘the wrath to come.’ Typically when we think of wrath, we think of a severe, out of control anger. If this wrath to come is from God, we should…..
There are three Gospel readings for Holy Saturday. I’m being drawn to write briefly about Matthew 27:63. The Chief Priest and Pharisees call Jesus an ‘imposter’ and then tell Pilate they remember what Jesus said about rising in three days.
These are enemies of his and they remember some of the same things Jesus’ friends do…..
In the church we are often reminded that Jesus only had three years of ministry.
Those three years are still being thought about and talked about because they brought about such astounding changes in the lives of so many people over the years. Over the years . . . most of the people who have been impacted by Jesus’ three years of ministry have been impacted by them after his death, after his resurrection and after his ascension. Those three…..
There is alot of talk about wisdom in the bible. One of my favorite verses is Matthew 11:19 which states how wisdom is determined, how it’s discerned and identified – by actions.
When I chose the subtitle of my book, Praying Our Way Through Stress, I chose ‘Drawing Wisdom from the Lord’s Life and Prayer’ because of…..
I’ve been thinking about how Christmas comes upon us making things new year after year throughout generations. Whether it’s celebrated with Santa Claus or Jesus or both. I grew up with both influences. Santa made sure nobody went without a gift – every boy and girl all around the world would receive a gift – a nice one – or coal. The whole naughty or nice thing really puts pressure on kids to behave and control themselves as parents feel…..
I’ve been thinking about all the things happening in this world and the arguments for and against religion and people blaming war on religion and how others blame war on politics and I wonder why we don’t blame war on people? Yes – to me it makes so much more sense to blame war on people than on institutions. We blame human actions on institutions because it’s hard…..
These verses wrap up the Sermon on the Mount bringing it full circle.
The kingdom of heaven gives to the poor in Spirit, filling them up so they may share the kingdom with other people who either have never heard of God’s love and a heavenly kingdom, or those who know but are depleted. Even Jesus went away to…..
Last evening my husband and I went to church. The Parish Priest asked, “Does anyone feel called to read the Scriptures?” Inside I smiled – I have always felt called to read the Scriptures, from the time I was in Sunday School I can remember waiting until I was ‘old’ enough to be able to read them during our class. Finally, when I was old enough to read them in class my teacher told me that if I wanted to…..
Someone asked me once if it was possible for a person to ‘lose their salvation.’ Not understanding what they meant I had to ask them and they replied: Well, do you believe in the saying “Once saved, always saved.” or do you think we can lose our salvation?
I had to think about this for a moment because I hadn’t heard that saying before they quoted it to me and it sounded rather odd to me. Finally I answered ……