{"id":4084,"date":"2016-06-12T10:00:23","date_gmt":"2016-06-12T14:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/?p=4084"},"modified":"2016-06-08T12:57:10","modified_gmt":"2016-06-08T16:57:10","slug":"reflections-on-the-scriptural-readings-for-this-weekend-20160612","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/?p=4084","title":{"rendered":"Reflections on the Scriptural Readings for this Weekend — 20160612"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"centurionsservant\"<\/a>On this fourth weekend after Pentecost, our readings are taken from St. Paul\u2019s Letter to the Romans and St. Matthew\u2019s Gospel. They both seem to center on the nature of faith and the impact that faith can have on our lives.<\/p>\n

Paul suggests that the \u201cway of Jesus\u201d is a way that makes us \u201cslaves of God\u201d and that the benefit of this is \u201csanctification\u201d as you \u201ctend toward eternal life.<\/p>\n

Paul then concludes his thoughts by expressing his belief that when a person attempts to live as Jesus lived, God\u2019s response is \u201ceternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord\u201d. To live like Jesus requires that we believe He is God\u2019s revelation to us on how we should live if we want to experience eternal life.<\/p>\n

We must remember that a person can only experience what he\/she believes to be true. If a person doesn\u2019t believe there is such a thing as \u201ceternal life\u201d, then this means nothing.<\/p>\n

The Gospel relates the story of the cure of a centurion\u2019s servant. Although he was a Roman soldier – someone hated by most people in the society in which Jesus lived – he had such love for his serving boy that he dared to approach Jesus for the favor of a cure. He expressed great faith in the power of Jesus by first saying that he was \u201cnot worthy\u201d to have Jesus under his roof and that he believed that all Jesus had to do was \u201cjust give an order\u201d and that the boy would be healed.<\/p>\n

What absolute faith in the power of Jesus. In fact Jesus recognizes the centurion\u2019s faith and says: \u201cI assure you, I have never found this much faith in Israel.\u201d Jesus then said: \u201cit shall be done because you trusted\u201d. This raises the question of our own trust in God.<\/p>\n

We are called to place our trust in Jesus, Who is God incarnate. To trust in Him means that we truly believe that His response to our prayers will always be what is best for us. This may mean, however, that we may not receive exactly what we seek. True trust in God is the belief that whatever we receive, even after we ask for it, is truly in our best interest.<\/p>\n

This, I know, can be difficult for us humans to accept. We always believe that we know what is best for us, even though that may not be true in the long run. It is a matter of believing that God allows life to present exactly what we need to grow in our firm belief in His unconditional love. Our Eternal Father truly only wants what is best for us.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Do you believe this!<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On this fourth weekend after Pentecost, our readings are taken from St. Paul\u2019s Letter to the Romans and St. Matthew\u2019s Gospel. They both seem to center on the nature of faith and the impact that faith can have on our … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-from-the-liturgy-of-the-day"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4084"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4084\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4086,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4084\/revisions\/4086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}