Vigilant.\u00c2\u00a0 Jesus wants us to be vigilant, to be watchful, lest a thief come and steal us blind.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Modern day thieves come in many forms.\u00c2\u00a0 But the ones we need to look out for the most are the spiritual thieves- thieves who rob us of our innocence or our dignity, or our virtue.\u00c2\u00a0 These are the thieves who ruin our relationship with God, so that when the Lord returns, we are not ready.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
The world is full of these kinds of thieves.\u00c2\u00a0 Some of them offer pleasure and power at the expense of our innocence or dignity or virtue.\u00c2\u00a0 Their theme is “Have a good time now, enjoy life” \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0But we must always be vigilant that we don’t put God’s plan for us on the back burner by abandoning God’s law and his plan for us.\u00c2\u00a0 For example, we cannot afford to defer our responsibilities to our children, or our responsibilities to know, love, and serve God; and we cannot afford to be sidetracked by subtle forms of addiction- food, sex, sports, or whatever they may be.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
And then there are those who argue that we should be tolerant of other values because we live in a free society.\u00c2\u00a0 But some of these values move society away from God, and they can slowly poison our own relationship with God.\u00c2\u00a0 The Pro Choice agenda, Cohabitation before Marriage, and spending beyond our means come to mind.\u00c2\u00a0 Before you know it, we can find ourselves drifting away from our core values because “everybody does it”. \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Indeed, we are advised that we should always be prepared for the return of the Lord.\u00c2\u00a0 And as the Gospel parable clearly says, that preparation includes responsible stewardship of the Master’s precious affairs.\u00c2\u00a0 What could be more precious than our core values?\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
When we are in the prime of life, the return of the Lord seems so remote and distant.\u00c2\u00a0 But, the reality is that life is very precious.\u00c2\u00a0 Just a couple of weeks ago, one of our parishioners, a young woman, died from complications to childbirth.\u00c2\u00a0 And at the same time, a young parishioner of 22 died in a terrible car crash.\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0Just this week, a seven year old girl in our parish died suddenly.\u00c2\u00a0 Indeed, it can happen to any of us.\u00c2\u00a0 So be watchful, and be prepared for the Lord’s return by guarding your core values as Christians.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Thursday of the 21st Week in Ordinary Time 1 Cor 1: 1-9; Mt 24: 42-51 Dc. Larry Brockman Vigilant.\u00c2\u00a0 Jesus wants us to be vigilant, to be watchful, lest a thief come and steal us blind.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Modern day thieves come in many forms.\u00c2\u00a0 But the ones we need to look out for the most are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}