<\/p>\n
So, “Before the Lord, the whole universe is as a grain from a balance”.\u00c2\u00a0 Does that make God so big that he just doesn’t care about you- you and I, who are as a grain on a balance compared to the whole universe?\u00c2\u00a0 Does God make us, reject us when we go awry, and cast us off forever to Hell in favor of some other part of His vast creation?\u00c2\u00a0 Such a dreadful, fearful thought.\u00c2\u00a0 Quite the opposite, because the infinite Love of God is the theme of today’s liturgy.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
One thing is certain, God must care for all of us as the logic in our first reading attests:\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0“for what you hated, you would not have fashioned”.\u00c2\u00a0 Indeed, why would God make something if He did not find some favor with it?\u00c2\u00a0 God simply does will that we exist, or we wouldn’t exist at all.\u00c2\u00a0 And it is certain that all of us exist, along with the huge universe that we are immersed in.\u00c2\u00a0 Indeed, all of God’s creation has value to God.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now, none of us, and indeed, nothing that God creates, is as perfect as He is.\u00c2\u00a0 All God’s creation is, by definition, limited and less than God.\u00c2\u00a0 And so, all God’s creation needs to be molded, fashioned, and shaped to conform to God’s will for it.\u00c2\u00a0 That is especially true for that part of creation that God has endowed with two of His special gifts- the gifts of free will and intelligence.\u00c2\u00a0 We are special, and God loves us with passion.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
How does God love us with passion?\u00c2\u00a0 First, God is patient with us.\u00c2\u00a0 We hear that “He rebukes offenders little by little that they may abandon their wickedness and believe in you”.\u00c2\u00a0 How does he do that for you and I?\u00c2\u00a0 In a word- consequences.\u00c2\u00a0 Yes, there are consequences of everything we do- some favorable, and some unfavorable; some short term, and some long term.\u00c2\u00a0 I think if you are honest with yourself, and someone asked you if you had it to do, “would you want to do your life all over again?’, most of you would say “no; once is enough”.\u00c2\u00a0 We savor the wonderful experiences of life, and would not want to give them up by living life over again- a wonderful spouse, children, grandchildren, talents, and experiences of God’s beautiful world.\u00c2\u00a0 These are but some of the things that have made life worthwhile.\u00c2\u00a0 But these are also consequences of choices that we have made.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now on the other side, there are the painful consequences of choices we have made in our lives.\u00c2\u00a0 And while we would like to have avoided them, there is another emotion at play.\u00c2\u00a0 We say: “I wouldn’t want to have to go through that again”.\u00c2\u00a0 And what that means is that we all have learned lessons from the painful consequences of our actions.\u00c2\u00a0 Chances are, if we are honest about it, we are sorry for the actions that caused those painful consequences.\u00c2\u00a0 We may even have reformed our lives to avoid them after the first occurrence.\u00c2\u00a0 But in any event, the learning that we achieved takes precedence over the thought of re-living that phase of our lives.\u00c2\u00a0 That, I think, is the way God intended it.\u00c2\u00a0 Truth is consequence.\u00c2\u00a0 And God’s truth is his way of admonishing us- little by little.\u00c2\u00a0 For those of us with long lives, we have lots of that learning- but the good thing is that it is all behind us.\u00c2\u00a0 And we are still here- part of the creation that God has been patient with, with a chance to say yes, and do God’s will.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Second, God actively and lovingly seeks us out during our lives. \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0We do not have a God who is passive, as some, such as the deists, would attest.\u00c2\u00a0 In fact, God especially seeks out the lost.\u00c2\u00a0 Just look at the Gospel story, where Jesus says:\u00c2\u00a0 For the Son of man has come to seek and save what was lost”.\u00c2\u00a0 Zacchaeus, the tax collector, was an ideal example.\u00c2\u00a0 Tax collectors were the scum of Jewish society because they were viewed as having sold out to the great Satan- the state.\u00c2\u00a0 Often they would cheat people out of as much in taxes as they could, and keep some for themselves.\u00c2\u00a0 That is why the crowd grumbled when Jesus asked Zacchaeus to host a dinner for him.\u00c2\u00a0 People like Zacchaeus were to be shunned, avoided, black balled; rather than be sought after.\u00c2\u00a0 What is God telling us in this story?\u00c2\u00a0 Simply that Almighty God, the God who the universe is but a grain of sand to, has elected to come and live among us and to seek out even the worst in society- lovingly, and without harsh judgment in hopes that they will believe, repent, reform, and follow Him.\u00c2\u00a0 Doing that for such as Zacchaeus means that he is doing that for all of us as well.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
How is he doing that for you and I?\u00c2\u00a0 Well, we are invited to his banquet constantly- events like Sunday Mass and this Communion Service.\u00c2\u00a0 He has left us the story of His legacy- the Bible, In which we are constantly sought out to do His will.\u00c2\u00a0 And He sends people among us, His agents, who bring us closer to Him.\u00c2\u00a0 It can be our Children, our Grandchildren, our Parents, our Priest, our Friends.\u00c2\u00a0 Indeed, Jesus is constantly seeking us out to tell us, that: “Today salvation has come to this house”.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
31st Sunday of Ordinary Time Wis 11:22 – 12:2; 2 Thes 11:11 – 2:2; Luke 19: 1-10 Dc. Larry Brockman So, “Before the Lord, the whole universe is as a grain from a balance”.\u00c2\u00a0 Does that make God so big that he just doesn’t care about you- you and I, who are as a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141"}],"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=141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}