Fourth Week of Lent Reflection
4th Week of Lent 2018
Live Lent with me
Timothy Duff, STM, MA Cert. RCHL
What do we do when we see someone being picked on or made fun of in school? Do we stick up for them? When was the last time you stopped at a traffic light and a homeless person held a sign-up at your window? What did you do? Did you just drive off? Are we are brother's keeper? This week of Lent is a time to reflect on such things. When was the last time you really advocated for someone?
In today’s first reading this Sunday we hear about the Babylonian Captivity. God withdraws his protective blessing and allows the Jewish people to be overrun by their enemies. The survivors are carried away as servant slaves to a foreign land. I wonder about those stories that often happen when a nameless stranger mysteriously takes someone in to save them.
What opportunity is God giving you to be that stranger? May I encourage you and challenge you to look for that circumstance in your life this week. Perhaps you might be surprised to find the face of Christ in the person you will help.
“Listen to Our Lord saying to you, I looked for someone to comfort me and I FOUND ONE!” (St. Teresa 1997) This way we are living Lent.
Source: June 1997 St Teresa of Calcutta to the Duff’s http://guildbjlabre.org/Membership/VIP-Members
The Following Reflection is from Bishop Barron, Word on Fire Ministries
Fourth Sunday of Lent- Gospel Reflection
JOHN 3:14-21
Friends, our Gospel passage today includes one of Jesus’ best-known and best-loved sayings. The Lord is speaking to Nicodemus and he tells him, "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life."
Why does the Son come? Because God is angry? Because God wants to lord it over us? Because God needs something? No, he comes purely out of love, God’s desire that we flourish. "For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him."
It is not in order to work out his anger issues that the Father sends the Son, but that the justice of the world might be restored. Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s salvific intent, displayed throughout the Old Testament.
source: Bishop Barron Lenton email for Lent day 26, Word on Fire Catholic Ministries 2018
