18TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME A
JOIN JESUS IN LOVING
What do we have here in the first reading (Isaiah 55:1-3)? It’s everyone’s dream buffet!
Eat and drink all you want… without paying, without need for money. Just come and join the fun!
The Lord is describing what we all need…
We are thirsty and in need of drink, hungry and in need of food.
And God will give us all these and more, even abundant life!
That is marvelous! Nothing can be greater than a life secure, with all our needs in endless supply.
That is what the Bible says. Is that what life holds, too?
In this pandemic, so many people lost their jobs, so many businesses had to fold up and close, so many people go hungry and cold.
Sure, the government distributed some help, some kilos of rice and a few cans of sardines, a pittance from the amelioration fund. But for a family that has to eat three times a day, how long did it last?
During the lockdown, a young man was walking in the rain with a sack of unripe mangoes.
He cleaned a rich person’s yard and got the mangoes as his pay. He had to sell them first before he could buy something for his family.
The man was a construction worker like his father and their work stopped due to the virus scare.
So where is God’s buffet? Where’s the free food and drink? Is God’s promise a mere fantasy?
God truly provides, we must not doubt his great love, his care and his goodness.
But God enlists instruments to make his dreams happen. In the gospel (Mt 14), when the apostles were expecting Jesus to give the hungry multitude food, he said to his apostles: you yourselves give them food!
The apostles were shocked. Jesus was the powerful one, not they. But they understood later on.
They were there to move around the crowd, to talk to them and listen to their stories, and to distribute the food to them.
Jesus’ generosity reached the last hungry person, imagine there were over 5,000 people, through the goodness of his apostles. They were part of his plan of helping others.
When I heard the young man calling at the gate and saw that he was drenched in the rain, I invited him in to rest and to eat what little food I have left.
It was not much but I was sure it was a sign of love from Jesus through me.
We are living in hard times, and yet the goodness of God never stops.
Do you allow yourself to be part of his plan to show love and care to his children, to your brothers and sisters in need around you?
(Pls share with a friend…)