The paradox!

4 april 2020

The last day before Palm Sunday, the start of the Holy Week.
The title that I have given to this reflection is "The Paradox"

Just read the first lines of the Gospel Reading and you will notice the paradox.
The conversion of those MANY JEWS seems to be irrelevant in comparison to those SOME who went to the Pharisees.

There's a saying: "A falling tree makes more noise than a growing forest".

As we end this challenge of the Lenten Season, let's not forget that  "The Paradox" of faith will accompany us always, especially when we see all darkness, let's never forget that soon comes the "new dawn". If everything seem difficult, it's because "the Best is about to come".   

Let's learn to find the meaning of faith, it's not when all or everything is perfect, but it is when or despite of all the imperfections, we remain to the Promise of the Lord: "Be still for I am God".

The presence of God is not the absence of all the persecutors or to those who go against us.  The best sign that we God is guiding us when we remain to the Word of God, and because of His Word we will be persecuted, ridiculed and even considered weird. 



Let us pray:

Lord Jesus,
in you we entrust those people who causes us problems:
those who hurt us and have caused us traumas,
those who supposed to BE our parents and siblings, but never showed their love and care;
those whom we considered as important people, because once they were friends, but then they turned to be enemies;
those whom we hate so much because we consider them as obstacles of our joy and success...

Lord we pray for all, that you may heal our hearts and give us a new way of seeing things.
A new vision of life, in order not to give powers to our failures to comand and determine our present and as well as our future.

Jesus, unite us more to the Love of the Father and may the Holy Spirit build in us a new attitude of life.

From the Gospel according to John
JN 11:45-56

Many of the Jews who had come to Mary
and seen what Jesus had done began to believe in him.
But some of them went to the Pharisees
and told them what Jesus had done.
So the chief priests and the Pharisees
convened the Sanhedrin and said,
“What are we going to do?
This man is performing many signs.
If we leave him alone, all will believe in him,
and the Romans will come
and take away both our land and our nation.”

But one of them, Caiaphas,
who was high priest that year, said to them,
“You know nothing,
nor do you consider that it is better for you
that one man should die instead of the people,
so that the whole nation may not perish.”
He did not say this on his own,
but since he was high priest for that year,
he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation,
and not only for the nation,
but also to gather into one the dispersed children of God.

So from that day on they planned to kill him.
 So Jesus no longer walked about in public among the Jews,
but he left for the region near the desert, to a town called Ephraim,
and there he remained with his disciples.

Now the Passover of the Jews was near,
and many went up from the country to Jerusalem
before Passover to purify themselves.

They looked for Jesus and said to one another
as they were in the temple area, “What do you think?
That he will not come to the feast?”