Stranger Helping Stranger

~~~Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time~~~

~~~ Deuteronomy 30:10-14 ~~~ 

~~~ Psalm 19 ~~~ Colossians 1:15-20 ~~~ Luke 10:25-37 ~~~

Your words, Lord, are Spirit and life.

If only we would trust this psalm refrain to be true.

Moses gives us some helpful insight.

He assures us that what we are searching for is very near.

In fact so very near that it is a part of our essence.

It is within our soul even if it is lying dormant.

 ...something very near to you,

already in your mouths and in your hearts;

you have only to carry it out.

The Spirit and Life of the Lord

are waiting to be drawn out for our immediate use.

The Samaritan traveler knew how and when

 to act on what was placed upon his heart.

He stopped to render aid to a complete stranger.

Would you consider such a person your neighbor?

Would you find some excuse

 to move on by the wounded person?

This stranger did more than call for someone 

else to come care for the wounded stranger.

This is a beautiful example of one stranger

 stopping to help another stranger.

Perhaps we are comfortable stopping to help a friend,

but helping a stranger is something different.

We all have neighbors who are our friends 

and neighbors who are strangers.

Sometimes it takes some form of disaster 

before we are moved to render aid to our neighbors 

who are also strangers.

Both the priest, and the Levite found ways to avoid the stranger.

They made up their own excuse to not access what 

should have already been in their heart. 

But a Samaritan traveler who came upon him

was moved with compassion at the sight. 

How can we love our neighbor as ourselves

if we ignore those in need...

if we avoid those who are hurting...

if we cross over to the other side of the road?

Ask yourself,

Who is my neighbor?

You know the answer.

It is already on your lips and in your heart.

The next step is to make

 your actions reflect God's mercy.

Who is the next neighbor you will help?

Blessed to act with mercy and compassion.

Our neighbor is no longer a stranger.

~~~Peace ~~~

The Waiting Room

~~~ Isaiah 30:19-21, 23-26 ~~~ Psalm 147 ~~~ Matthew 9:35-10:1, 5A, 6-8 ~~~

 Blessed are all who wait for the Lord.

Waiting is sometime a tedious task to undertake.
So many times we wait for news of medical tests filled with anxiety.
We wait for a return phone call with the test results.

Just this week I was waiting
 in the doctor's office with my mother.
The man sitting across was also waiting when his phone rang
cracking open the silence in the room.
The voice on the other end was a doctor informing him that his wife
of many years was being referred to hospice.
Hospice...not many people are waiting
to receive that kind of news.

The man initially listened intently
but soon his tense face gave way to tears.
His waiting was now becoming a very different type of waiting.
His waiting from that moment forward
was the waiting for his wife's last breath.

He would no longer be the witness to her pain, now his wait
was going to be one of letting go of the love of his life.
Letting go of the mother of his children.
Letting go of his lover.

This is not the joyful waiting of an infant birth
 this is the resigned waiting of the end.
This poor man whom we did not know
was waiting on the Lord
to accept his wife back to heaven.
This man was plunged into this period of waiting
 sitting in a roomful of strangers.

All I could do, as the tears ran down his cheeks,
was to offer him some tissues and express my sorrow for him.

He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.

His heart was broken...there were no
 thoughts of healing right now.
His only thoughts were I knew this was coming.
He did not know his time of waiting was over.
He no longer waited to hear if she would get better.
He no longer waited to hear the doctor say he had a cancer cure.

He no longer waited for their happy times together.

We wait for many different reasons;
sometimes we wait for good, happy things...
sometimes we wait to hear what we do not want to hear.

This man will now be waiting for God
to bind up his broken heart...
to bind up his wounds of loss.
This man will wait for God
to fill the emptiness within his heart.

Advent is a time of waiting.
Waiting is not as passive as we might expect.
Waiting is time we can use to pause...to take a long look inside.
Waiting in stillness
 relying on God because
nothing else really matters.

Waiting
precedes either joy or sorrow
Waiting.

Look for the Blessings as you wait.
May we wait in peace.

Tip the Scales

 

~~~ Exodus 1:8-14, 22 ~~~ Psalm 124 ~~~ Matthew 10:34—11:1 ~~~

 

Jesus broadened the scope, by showing us

 that our neighbor may be a stranger.

While this seems contradictory, it is what Jesus

gives us to reflect upon.

 

If a stranger can be considered our neighbor

worthy of our compassion;

then our family may likewise be a source of evil.

Sometimes the best way to get your point across

 is to polarize the issue at hand.

Presenting the extremes helps us to identify where we fall in between

or where we want to strive towards.

 

Jesus said to his Apostles:
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the earth.
I have come to bring not peace but the sword.

 

The sword????

 

Jesus wants to rid the world of darkness...of all evil influences.

He uses examples concerning those we may not even consider...

fathers, mothers, daughters, sons etc.

 

Our true peace does not lie within our family members.

Our true peace lies within our personal relationship with God.

Can we honestly say that we love God above all else?

 

 

We are being invited to evaluate our personal relationship with others.

 

Consider how much you love your parents.

Consider how much you love your siblings.

Consider how much you love your spouse.

Consider how much you love your children.

 

Imagine that no matter how great your love is for others in your life;

you must love God even more.

 

This is hard to determine because love

is not something we can measure.

Love initially springs forth from the heart via chemicals

released into the blood stream.

We have the feelings associated with 'being in love'.

Eventually as these chemicals dissipate

we must use our mind to make the intention to love.

 

The chemical induced love cannot sustain our love for another.

Loving God requires effort on our part

because we are constantly being presented with reasons not to love.

 

We fall into the trap of blaming God for whatever

does not go well in our lives.

There are so many temptations in this world hiding in plain sight

that we actually miss them.

 

Jesus tells his disciples...open your mind...

expand your vision of that which is good,

 but also of that which is potentially evil.

 

We live in a world where it sometimes appears

that evil is stronger than good.

We must make the commitment to live in such a way

as to have no doubt

of our intentional commitment

to that which is good.

Our help is in the name of the Lord.

 

Our Blessings come in

what we do to make love stronger than evil.

How are we living our conviction

 to love God above all else

and our neighbor as ourselves?

 

This week be aware

 of how you can love with greater depth.

Tip the scales with your love for what is of God.