Death Fulfills the Promise

August 8: Friday of Week 18 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Nahum 2:1, 3; 3:1-3, 6-7; Canticle: Deuteronomy 32:35-36, 39, 41; Matthew 16:24-28

Thoughts to help us surrender to Jesus expressing himself through us in ministry.

“Never again shall the wicked invade you; he is utterly cut off.” Nahum 1:15 or 2:1

Promises, promises… In truth, Israel was invaded again repeatedly—and is inviting destruction today by relying totally on force and retaliation instead of on God.

And we ourselves are invaded constantly by bad desires and thoughts. Jesus says we won’t be delivered unless we accept to “lose our lives.”

We did that when we accepted to die with and in Christ at Baptism. Then all of our sins—past, present and future—were “taken away,” annihilated when we went down into the grave with him and rose as a “new creation” (Romans 6:3; 2Corinthians 5:17).

But the physical results of sin, including the attitudes and inclinations “programmed” into us by our infected culture, will not disappear until we say “Yes” to dying physically. That “Yes,” in which we surrender ourselves to death in total faith, hope and love, is our final purification.

Then in unqualified truth, “Never again shall the wicked invade us.” Everything evil will be “utterly cut off.” We will have “life to the full” in total union with God.

In the meantime we give and receive ministry in hope. We keep our eyes on the “end time,” when we will “know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge,” and “be filled with all the fullness of God.”

That is the mantra that motivates our ministry.

PRAY: “Lord, deliver us from evil.”

PRACTICE: Die to yourself through love.