A LEVEL PLACE…

Jeremiah 17:5-8

5 Thus says the LORD: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his arm, whose heart turns away from the LORD. 6 He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come. He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land.
7 “Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD.
8 He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.”

1 Corinthians 15:12,17-20

12 Now if Christ is preached as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?
16 For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised.17 If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.
18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished.
19 If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all men most to be pitied. 20 But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.

Luke 6:17,20-26

17 And he came down with them and stood on a level place, with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea and Jerusalem and the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear him and to be healed of their diseases;
20 And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said: “Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.
21 “Blessed are you that hunger now, for you shall be satisfied. “Blessed are you that weep now, for you shall laugh.
22 “Blessed are you when men hate you, and when they exclude you and revile you, and cast out your name as evil, on account of the Son of man!
23 Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets. 24 “But woe to you that are rich, for you have received your consolation. 25 “Woe to you that are full now, for you shall hunger. “Woe to you that laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep. 26 “Woe to you, when all men speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets.  

MEDITATION

THE PROPHET JEREMIAH caution the people of God to not put their stock in the promises of fallible men whose empty words and actions shall produce a state of decay, because their hearts are not rooted in the living word of the Lord. 

THE SECOND READING: Paul respond to teachers who preached that believers in Christ will not be raised from the dead, whilst they affirm that Christ is the first fruit of God’s mercy who raised Him up from the dead! Paul dispel that antithetical notion, when he makes the point that Christs ressurection is indeed the evidence and foundation of our hope that we too shall be raised from the dead on the last day. 

St LUKE DESCRIBE the scene of the gathering of the disciples of Christ to highlight that Christ is so to speak on level ground with His audience. Whilst Jesus is very aware of the “multitude” who were afflicted and needy, He foccused His gaze exclusively on His priestly disciples; teaching them the beatitudes, which they were called to teach, apply and appropriate in their daily lives.

Catec 1719 The Beatitudes reveal the goal of human existence, the ultimate end of human acts: God calls us to his own beatitude. This vocation is addressed to each individual personally, but also to the Church as a whole, the new people made up of those who have accepted the promise and live from it in faith…2548 Desire for true happiness frees man from his immoderate attachment to the goods of this world so that he can find his fulfillment in the vision and beatitude of God. “The promise [of seeing God] surpasses all beatitude. . . . In Scripture, to see is to possess. . . . Whoever sees God has obtained all the goods of which he can conceive.”

We are obligated to make Christ known to those who have their heads in a cloud because they have placed their hope in materialism and secularism; a false state of living that have as its end, emptyness and misery! The beatitudes place you and I on level ground with our pastors and teachers in the sense that we are also called to be exemplary witnesses of the savific message and promises of Christ Jesus. 

LET US PRAY:Psalms 1:1-4,6
1 Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; 2 but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.

3 He is like a tree planted by streams of water, that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.4 The wicked are not so, but are like chaff which the wind drives away.6 for the LORD knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.

Commentary. Henry R SYLVESTER Note: The daily scripture readings are taken from the Roman Missal which the Catholic Church use in the daily Celebration of the Holy Eucharist throughout the world.Some weekly readings may differ because of the celebration of local feast days.