The Lord is ready to change you: are you ready for to be changed?
Although the singer of Psalm 30 tells us that his lack of
energy has been draining him of life, he can now, thanks to God’s intervention,
report that his mourning has been changed into dancing, giving him all the
energy necessary for new life. We too
are called to be changed, radically changed, this time by the Resurrection of
Jesus Christ.
In this week’s Gospel from John, Peter knows what it feels
like to be changed: his metanoia comes
when, having met Jesus on the shore after the Resurrection, he is given the
opportunity to assure the Lord, not once but three times, that he loves him – Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you – thereby negating
his triple denial of Jesus during the Passion.
He and his fellow disciples are ready to do what Jesus tells them, ready
to throw out their nets after a night of fruitless fishing, ready to fish for
men by proclaiming the Good News. They
are ready to be changed by the Resurrection.
The fruits of this changed position are evident in our
reading from Acts, where we see Peter and the disciples healing and prophesying
and being imprisoned for their activities:
they have indeed been radically changed by their encounter with Jesus,
unlike the Jewish authorities, who resist any such change and stubbornly deny
the miracles taking place before their very eyes: We gave
you strict orders, did we not, to stop teaching in that name? They have failed to acknowledge the power of
the Jesus in their lives, failed to note, as John does in Revelation, that To the one who sits on the throne and to the
Lamb is given blessing and honor,
glory and might, forever and ever. They are not changed.
Resurrection calls us to be
changed, to allow our very identity to be changed by Jesus, alive and present
in and among us. Are you ready? Then
shout out your response, like the psalmist who cries, I will extol you Lord, for you drew me clear, or, like the four living creatures of Revelation,
Amen!
This post is based on Fr. Pat's Scripture class.
Image source: Wordle
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