Philippians 3:17 - 4:1 / Luke 16:1-8
We await Christ's final coming: He will refashion our mortal bodies.
The reconstructed palace is a glorious symbol of the national pride of the Polish people. The castle is also "a remarkable example of how the human spirit can rise and reconstruct works of architecture, art, and culture. . . . [It] helps us to understand the more marvellous restoration the Lord will accomplish in our resurrection from the dead." Albert Cylwicki
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Do we look upon death as the destruction of our body or as the beginning of its reconstruction? "A man is not completely born until he is dead." Benjamin Franklin
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For Paul, the greatest sign of the gratuitous love of God is the cross. He exhorts his Philippians once more not to let themselves be misled by the Judaizers but to stand firm in the Lord. Paul reminds his hearers today to be on guard. There are people who are enemies of the cross of Christ. They are lost in selfish and evil concerns, eating and drinking to excess, engaging in sexual misconduct. They are destined for destruction. But we are citizens of the heavenly country, from where we expect our Savior to return. He will transform our mortality into immortality, conferring on us the glorification that is now his. And what must our posture be? Stand firm in the Lord! We too live in the midst of what is in many ways an evil generation. We must avoid being seduced and losing sight of our goal.
Many times, some of our best ideas come about out of a desperate situation. It takes some urgency or emergency to get us to try out ideas and options that we would not have considered before. Such was the case with the dishonest steward in today's gospel. This parable can be difficult to interpret and understand if we don't understand the point that Jesus was making. Jesus was pointing out the urgency and energy with which a worldly man secures his future when it is in jeopardy. Jesus is even urging us, the children of light, to have urgency when it comes to our eternal future. Otherwise, as the 1st reading puts it, we might end up making food into our god and can even be proud of something that we ought to be shameful and worldly things are the only important things to us.
St. Paul urged his people not to give way but to remain faithful to the Lord. Hence the urgency is not to get into a flurry of activity to prepare for our eternal destiny. Rather the urgency is in the ordinary and the monotony of life.
When we can be faithful to the Lord in the small ordinary things and remain focused on the Lord despite the monotony of life, then we are prepared for eternal life.
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Whatever the unknown context of today’s parable may have been, the central thought of Jesus’ words seems to be this: Much has been entrusted to us and we will have to give an account for it to God. We must act responsibly, keeping our goal in mind: God and our neighbor. Let us be people who try to know where we are going and what we are doing.
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Let us Pray: Lord our God, you have made us responsible with you for many persons and things: for ourselves, for other people, for the future of this world. May we be good stewards of all you have entrusted to us. Help us to use our talents wisely and well in the service of all that is good, always inspired by faith and living in the love of Jesus Christ, our Lord.
