Sunday Gospel Reflection, April 26, 2020: Were not our hearts burning within us?

Were not our hearts burning within us?

What do we gain when we sojourn with the Lord?

  We need to hear the Word of God.  When, in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus appears to two disciples walking from Jerusalem to Emmaus, they at first believe that he is unaware of the things that have taken place in Jerusalem in recent days.  But Jesus quickly points out that the problem lies in their own shortsightedness:  O how foolish you are, he tells them, How slow of heart to believe all that the prophets spoke!  As he sojourns with the disciples on the road to Emmaus, Jesus breaks opens the scriptures for them, one after another, demonstrating how each one points to how Jesus himself came to save them.  And, once he has broken open the scriptures, he also breaks bread with them, proclaiming God’s Word in such a way that they can hear it with their hearts.  And then he disappears.

  In the Acts of the Apostles, Peter embraces the task of proclaiming the Word of God, the good news of salvation, so that all can understand:  Let this be known to you, and listen to my words, he tells everyone staying in Jerusalem.  Peter cites scripture (Psalm 16) – you will not abandon my soul to the netherworld, nor will you suffer your holy one to see corruption – to remind his listeners that God sent Jesus to die and rise for us. The First Letter of Peter further clarifies the reasons for this gift:  to ransom us from our futile conduct.  Jesus is the ransom; Jesus redeemed Israel, paying the debt of sin then and continually on to the present day. Which means that each of us must be of value to God – for, would you pay a ransom for something that has no value? But we must be open to that redemption, open to the salvific love of God, open to sojourning with the Lord.

  When we let the Word of God enter our heart through scriptures and the breaking of the bread, when we allow the Lord to come and enter into us so that he can dwell in us and journey with us, we are sojourning with him.  Our sojourn is our life as journey, a pilgrimage to eternal life. If we focus on growing in the love of God, if we focus on what God is doing in us, on God walking with us, then the sojourn will have accomplished its goal:  that we might learn, through scriptures and through bread, just who God is and what God is doing in us every day.

This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture Class.

Image source:  www.wordclouds.com