Leaven
Insincerity and selfishness spoil things for us, to be able to come before God. James explains to us that temptations and failure is part of life. But so also remedying things by coming before God is a must, to continue in His presence.
Faith and Signs
The yeast of the Pharisees was their over caution, to the neglect of the heart, of God in the Law.
Unclean
Unclean, unclean most of us consider ourselves unclean especially with regards to sin. In the First Reading, Moses and Aaron are concerned with leprosy being a state of uncleanness while in the Second Reading Paul condemns the attitude of a divides church for Jews or Gentiles.
Feeding on God’s Word
Feeding on God’s Word is what really satisfies us. It is the source of baptismal conversion, since the Spirit takes what Jesus taught and preached, and through it opens our understanding to the ways and heart of God.
Be Opened!
Reading today’s Gospel Reading, we should desire with all our heart that the blindness of our eyes, the deafness in our ears and the coldness of our heart go away. Just as Jesus blessed this deaf person, we need to ask God that our senses be restored fully, also.
With All Heart, Mind and Being
Solomon was blessed, yet he faded away, why so? Because he let the gift become the center of his life. As a result pride and hunger for power set in and corrupted him. True wisdom is at God’s feet, made available, enough to fill the day, just like manna.
Troubles
Troubles we know are part of life. But how to do we look at them? Are they good or bad? To understand them we need to understand who God Is. He is good and right and correct. He is responsible for creation and the world around us remaining into existence and moving along.
The Heart of the Matter
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might…”
Jehovah Rophe – Our God Heals
Jesus is God, and for the love of humanity became incarnate and dwelt with humanity and became human. And to be associated with God means to have fullness. And that is what we see in todays Gospel reading.
Burden Bearer
Job in the First Reading is expressing the condition of humanity, post the fall of Adam and Eve, and it echoes God’s analysis/narration of what the life of Adam and Eve and their descendants would be because of the fall.