Looking Ahead

November 7: Friday of Week 31 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Philippians 3:17 to 4:1; Psalm 122:1-2, 3-4, 4-5; Luke 16:1-8

Click here for the complete text of today’s readings.

 What is Jesus saying to us as stewards of his kingship?

(To support  Reaching Jesus: 5 Steps to a Fuller Life ... Step Five )

Looking Ahead

“Our citizenship is in heaven; from it we await a Savior” (Philippians 3:20).

Jesus praises the unfaithful steward, not for his dishonesty, but for his survival skill. Knowing his employment was ending, he looked ahead and made friends with those who could save him from poverty.

Paul urges us to do the same. All of us are on earth with visas marked “Temporary Residence Only.” Our true “citizenship is in heaven,” so we need to be making friends with the one who can provide for us when we get there.

We are not just residents on earth, but stewards, managers of Christ’s kingship. The one to whom we will give an “account of our stewardship” is the same—and only—one who can take care of us after we die. We live on earth but work for a master in heaven, and what we do for him is the only thing that counts. So survival depends on looking ahead to the accounting we will give to him.

We don’t live in fear of this accounting. On the contrary, we look forward to it: “Let us go rejoicing to the house of the Lord” (Responsorial). Once we have accepted the mystery of “Christ in us, the hope of glory,” we say with Saint Paul: “To me, living is Christ and dying is gain” (Colossians 1:27; Philippians 1:21).

PRAY: “Lord, come when you are ready, and make me ready when you come!”

PRACTICE: Make the future part of the present.