Dear beloved,
⒈Why is there so more evil in the world? So much sickness, so much poverty, so much wickedness, so much suffering, so much injustice, sadness , pain, etc.?
Why do we have calamities, sorrows and death? The answer to all these is in the imperfect origin of all created things. The nothingness from which God created angels and men led to the possibility of sin, and from sin comes all the evils in the word.
⒉The Book of Genesis informs us that God made man in His divine image and likeness. He created out of love, to bestow His goodness on creatures, and to make them eternally happy as God Himself.
Because there is nothing in existence except God alone, He had to create out of nothing. NOTHING means Not God or Contrary to God. As God is order, nothing is disorder; God is peace, nothing is chaos; God is truth, nothing is vanity and falsehood; God is good, nothing is evil; God is life, nothing is death; God is health, nothing is sickness; God is a THING ,nothing is emptiness, void, lacuna etc. From out of nothing therefore, God drew out all creatures big and small, seen and unseen.
⒊Like every other creatures, God made man out of nothing, that is, out of naturally ungovernable passions such as, anger, hate, concupiscence,greed, envy, malice, pride ,lust, sloth, covetousness etc. After moulding man from what is Not God, the Almighty now gave man something from God Himself --a supernatural gift called Sanctifying Grace.
Sanctifying Grace is the life of God. It is peace, order, harmony, goodness, virtue, integrity and spirituality. God used this grace, which is not part of man, to wrap up human nature, so to say, and so to hold the evil tendencies in man in total control. As a result, Adam and Eve before the fall were:
- a. Free from pain and suffering;
- b. Free from error and mistake;
- c. Free from concupiscence ;
- d. Free from sickness, tiredness and hunger;
- e. Free from death.
The readings of today talked about the deplorable state of sickness and suffering to which our contact and association with sin and the devil has reduced man, and God's action and willingness to deliver man from this condition.
- In our First Reading of today, the prophet Isaiah is consoling all those laboring under the yoke of the devil and hoping to be delivered, that God is coming to save them. God will revenge on the devil and his agents, and apply retributive justice on them. The arrival of the Redeemer will open the eyes of the blind, the ears of the deaf and untie the tongues of the dumb. The lame and the paralyzed will jump up fr joy. Then water will gush in the desert and the parched land will become springs of water.
HOW WE MUST RELATE WITH RHE POOR, THE SICK AND THE LOWLY
- " Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy" According tonSt. Caesarius of Arles, all men wish to obtain mercy, few are ready to show mercy to others. You must show mercy in this life if you hope to receive it in the next. The mercy in heaven is attained through the mercy we perform on earth.
There are 2 kinds of mercy
- Human mercy
- Divine mercy.
Human mercy makes you attentive to the poor and suffering. Divine mercy forgives sinners and repays the generosity of human mercy given on earth.
The bottom line, beloved in Christ, the poor are of greater use to us than we are to them we give them earthly things and we are rewarded with heavenly things. We give them temporal things and we are rewarded with eternal things. Whatever we give them is multiplied for us a hundred fold, and capped with eternal life.
As Christians, let us continue the work of Christ and endeavor to relieve the poor, the sick, the needy and the distressed as much as we could.
Happy Sunday friends ⛪⛪
Love you all 💋
