Author: admin

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Gospel: Matthew 11: 20-24

Jesus began to reproach the towns
where most of his mighty deeds had been done,
since they had not repented.
“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida!
For if the mighty deeds done in your midst
had been done in Tyre and Sidon,
they would long ago have repented in sackcloth and ashes.
But I tell you, it will be more tolerable
for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you.
And as for you, Capernaum:

Will you be exalted to heaven?
You will go down to the nether world.

For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Sodom,
it would have remained until this day.
But I tell you, it will be more tolerable
for the land of Sodom on the day of judgment than for you.”

The Gospel of the Lord.

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A few years ago, the average cost of raising a child in America rose to a quarter of a million dollars. If you had two children, half a million. Four? Over a million. Today it’s even higher.

That’s excluding luxuries like beach vacations, private schools, and college tuition.

It’s nearly impossible – and ludicrous – for a child to imagine repaying their parents for every penny and dollar spent.  Not to mention the “intangibles” parents give: love, peace, security, hope, and wisdom.

While we cannot repay our parents in dollars and cents for our childhood blesssings, we can do two things: 

Say, “Thank you.” 

And pay it forward. 

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In today’s Gospel, Jesus chastises several towns he visited after performing miracles of healing and forgiveness.

While he wasn’t expecting to be repaid in terms of dollars and cents – he couldn’t be – Jesus did expect the townspeople to repent, to be thankful, and to pay his goodness forward.

But to his chagrin, they take him for granted by returning to their old ways of life as if the Lord was never there. 

“Woe to you!” he says. 

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Like the townspeople of Chorazin and Bethsaida, Jesus has done good things for us – both as individuals and as a community.

In what ways do we pay it forward? 

Maybe we extend his forgiveness to a neighbor after being forgiven ourselves. 

We feed the hungry after being fed by Christ. 

We intercede on another person’s behalf knowing both the Spirit and this community intercede for us.

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Much like children who cannot repay their parents, we cannot repay Jesus for his goodness to us. But we can pay it forward.

How might I do that today?

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Image credits: (1) LinkedIn (2) Quora (3) Syverson Strege

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Gospel: Matthew 10:34 – 11:1

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.
For I have come to set
a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
and one’s enemies will be those of his household.

“Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me,
and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me;
and whoever does not take up his cross
and follow after me is not worthy of me.
Whoever finds his life will lose it,
and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

“Whoever receives you receives me,
and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me.
Whoever receives a prophet because he is a prophet
will receive a prophet’s reward,
and whoever receives a righteous man
because he is righteous 
will receive a righteous man’s reward.
And whoever gives only a cup of cold water
to one of these little ones to drink
because he is a disciple–
amen, I say to you, he will surely not lose his reward.”

When Jesus finished giving these commands to his Twelve disciples,
he went away from that place to teach and to preach in their towns.

The Gospel of the Lord.

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“I have come to set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother.”

The last thing many families need in this modern world is more division. There are already plenty things that can divide us: politics, personality, identity, dreams. The list goes on. 

Why add faith to this potentially explosive equation?

It’s easy to wish a strong breeze came and swept this page away while Matthew was writing his Gospel. Surely, both he and Jesus understood how deeply families can hurt or help each other – the shared history and memories run so deep.

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But faith runs even deeper.

Deeper than DNA.

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There’s a God-shaped hole inside every human heart, which only God can fill – nothing else will satisfy it. Not even the best marriage, the tightest family, or all the money in the world. 

While these are certainly blessings, faith has a way of cutting us to the core when awakened.

I’ve listened to a number peers, for example, who have been happily married for years. But over time, one has experienced an emergent faith – a desire for Jesus – which the other has not. 

As a result, one spouse prays alone. Attends church alone. Questions alone. Or they begin seeking advice from those who have faith. While it’d be easier to ignore that God-shaped hole within, doing so only magnifies the reality it’s there. 

In that sense, faith can cause a rift in a marriage – not because faith is a negative thing, quite the opposite! – but because one spouse has ventured into a deeper level of reality – and themselves, while the other has not.

The same is true in terms of inter-generational relationships – parents versus children, and so on. I experienced this type of division when choosing to enter the seminary. Not everyone I loved shared the same desire for God.

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While this Gospel passage may leave us uneasy, it also points to a profound truth: we are loved – more than anyone, by God.

We belong to a family – more than any, to God’s family.

We will continue to search and seek until we find Who we are looking for. As Saint Augustine once proclaimed, “Our hearts are restless, until they rest in you, O LORD.”

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Image credits: (1) The New York Times (2) Grace Theological Seminary (3) Caffeinated Thoughts