Daily Reflection – July 29, 2016
Friday 29 July 2016
First Reading:
Jeremiah 26:1-9
Responsorial Psalm:
Lord, in your great love, answer me
Psalm 68(69):5, 8-10, 14
Gospel Reading: John 11:19-27
Today’s Saint: St Martha (Memorial)
Gospel Reading:
Many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary
to comfort them about their brother [Lazarus, who had died].
When Martha heard that Jesus was coming,
she went to meet him;
but Mary sat at home.
Martha said to Jesus,
“Lord, if you had been here,
my brother would not have died.
But even now I know that whatever you ask of God,
God will give you.”
Jesus said to her,
“Your brother will rise.”
Martha said to him,
“I know he will rise,
in the resurrection on the last day.”
Jesus told her,
“I am the resurrection and the life;
whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live,
and anyone who lives and believes in me will never die.
Do you believe this?”
She said to him, “Yes, Lord.
I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God,
the one who is coming into the world.”
Reflection:
‘I am the resurrection and the life.’
Many times, like Martha, we are torn between the wondrous faith we wish to uphold and the much more real and less glorified reality of our existence – our grief, our worries, our doubts and fears. We would like to take comfort in the promise of love and hope that God gives us, but it seems unattainable, too distant, too perfect to be true. Jesus, however, cuts right through the seemingly vast abyss. ‘I am the resurrection and the life!’. With him, life and resurrection is not just something we wait for on that far, uncertain ‘last day’; life is here and now, right before our eyes, speaking to us. He, himself, is the life and the resurrection; he who comes to us in times of sadness, he who weeps and grieves with us; he, the friend, who answers and becomes intimately present in time of need.
