“How often do I worry? How often do I find myself anxious of many things?”
Our worries and anxieties is part of our life the moment we have become aware of ourselves and of the world. Parents would naturally worry about their growing children. Lovers may feel anxious of the security in their relationship. Workers and professionals may worry with the demands of their work and their relationships among their colleagues and superiors. We may worry these days because we might be infected by covid with its new variant. We may worry also about the vaccine that it might have terrifying side-effects on us.
However, when our worries and anxieties reaches the smallest and most trivial things in life and settle on them, then, we will be lost and distracted so much. These trivial worries and anxieties could paralyze us to the point that we will lose our peace of mind and worst our capacity to choose and transcend difficult moments in life.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus invites his disciples to set their hearts and seek instead the kingdom of God. Jesus felt that the disciples had grown more worried about their food, their appearance before the people, their security and even their future. Because of so much worries and anxiety, they became distracted and settled only with trivial things in their life
Consequently, it made their hearts full that it prevented God to fill them, to surprise them and satisfy them. Jesus also wants us that we become free from worries and anxieties which only prevent God to come to us and fill us with his presence.
Thus, the Lord invites us today to seek God’s kingdom and His righteousness. This will brings us into confidence in God who is most generous to us. This is what we have heard from the Paul’s letter today. Paul acknowledged God’s voice saying to him, “My grace is sufficient for you.” Indeed, God’s grace sustains us and satisfies us only we are fully aware of God’s presence.
Today, we are called to seek God’s Kingdom. This means that we become more familiar with God’s presence in our everyday experiences. It is when we become familiar with His presence that we also grow in confidence and faith in God.
To seek God’s righteousness also means being more attuned with God’s desire for us. God’s desire lead us to peace, freedom and joy.
We may come and grew more in our confidence in God, whose grace is sufficient for us and therefore, find freedom from our unnecessary worries and anxieties. Hinaut pa.
Are you feeling overwhelming pressures from all sides these days? Pressure from work, pressure in your family caused by conflicts or demanding responsibilities, pressure caused by financial difficulties, pressure from your personal and trouble-filled romantic relationship could pile up until you feel suffocating. Students, perhaps, because of the new mode of learning, though are already familiar with latest technology, but still struggling these days due to the demands in their online classes and at home while suffering from emotional pain. These are just few examples that we are feeling these days considering also how we adjust ourselves with this pandemic around us.
With all of these, we also desire and hope for ways to better handle and manage these pressures that make us worry and troubled emotionally and spiritually. We desire peaceful nights where we can sleep free from worries. We long for a mind and a heart that though we continue to live in the midst of troubles and worries in life, but we could maintain a balanced way of life.
With the extra challenge of Covid-19 pandemic, the more we long for this today. Thus, it would be very good to find better ways and healthy ways of handling and managing the different pressures and worries we have in life for our mental and spiritual health. Our Gospel today suggests something that we could learn and adopt and develop into a habit. What the Gospel teaches us is a good way indeed, of maintaining balance and healthy awareness of oneself and of God’s presence in us.
This Gospel story tells us of Martha and Mary, sisters of Lazarus and good friends of Jesus. Let us see a bit deeper the different responses of Martha and Mary as they welcomed Jesus into their home.
It was Martha who welcomed Jesus into her home. Being friends of the Lord, it was Martha’s delight to welcome and receive Jesus. Martha being a concerned woman wanted to make the Lord and the disciples comfortable. Her concern and generosity made her busy with many things in the house. She must have been very busy cooking, providing food and drinks and serving the Lord. Yet, in her effort to do all of these, she grew worried and pressured. She must have done that out of generosity. Though she was not duty bound, but felt responsible. Yet, along the way, Martha must have lost her focus on the Lord. She was dominated by the pressures of serving the men and providing their comfort. She must have felt tired.
This was the reason why Martha sounded annoyed, troubled and restless. She became more concerned in “doing” that in the process she lost and forgot that “one important thing – Jesus.” With this, Martha lost her peace of mind and had lost the opportunity of spending quality time with Jesus who have come to visit them.
Well, Martha just did what was natural in their culture, and that was to express her hospitality to Jesus. However, when we let the different pressures around us to dominate our mind and heart and attitude, then, we too, like Martha will lose the opportunity of enjoying the presence and the company of people who love us.
Indeed, as Jesus identified Martha’s problem, “of being worried and troubled about many things,” he also emphasized the value of taking the opportunity of enjoying the comfort of the presence of those who love us. This was what Mary did. Mary sat at the feet of Jesus and listened to the words of the Lord. Mary set aside those troubles and worries first in order to make more time with the Lord. Mary did this because she knew that what the Lord requires her to do was not to do many things, but just to “waste time” with God at that moment.
Mary’s response made her more aware of Jesus’ presence and thus of her need of God. It was Jesus who visited them. This means that it was God who initiated the visit. Jesus came to visit them. Jesus wanted their company and desired that his friends will spend more time with him. Certainly, Mary found peace even in the midst of the worries and troubles in life.
There are three invitations that I would like you to remember today so that like Mary, we too shall find peace even though worries and troubles, difficulties and challenges remain. What surrounds us is beyond our control but what we can do is to change our attitude and response to what surround us. So, remember these.
1. Be aware of God’s visits. God visits us to surprise us any day and in any time of the day. God’s presence could be revealed through a friend, an encounter with a stranger or an event. We are called to be always welcoming of God’s presence and be filled with God’s peace through others.
2. Develop a habit to spend time alone with God. To be able to spend few minutes alone will allow us to gather our thoughts, to subside our strong feelings and emotional reactions, and to see things clearly. Having this time allows us also to become discerning in our actions and thoughts for us to respond to a particular situation in a mature and healthy way and according to God’s desire for us.
3. Spend quality time with people whom you love and who love you.To do this, we also need to be more aware of what is happening in us and around us. By recognizing what troubles us and what makes us worry, allows us to be more open to our loved ones. Thus, by spending quality time with them, we become more assured of their presence and find comfort in their love for us. This was the experience of Mary. She indeed found assurance in God’s love and comfort in God’s presence, thus, she found peace. Hinaut pa.
I am sure that we would find ourselves worrying about many things in life, almost everyday. You worry about your husband or your wife, or your growing children and the failing health of your parents. Or we worry about the demands of our job or the difficulties in our business, or about your new relationships, and newfound friends. We might also find ourselves worrying about our tomorrow, of what is to come the next day because of the uncertainties brought by the pandemic. Or worrying also about our unfulfilled dreams and unsatisfied desires.
Our worries and anxieties may prevent us from seeing things as they are because our minds and hearts are already troubled. When worries and anxieties overwhelm us too, we might not be able to respond properly and responsibly because we are internally disturbed.
Indeed, excessive worrying may lead us to high anxiety, which may cause us physical and mental illness. When this comes, our decision making process is also affected and our relationships with others and even with God will suffer.
That is why; it is very important that we remain calm and at peace with ourselves and with what surrounds us. It is in this way that we will be able to move forward with our life and will be able to respond generously to what God calls us to be.
Today, the Risen Jesus invites us to be confident with the gift that his resurrection brings to us. Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you but not as the world gives, do I give it to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.”
It would be good for us to see and understand what Jesus was saying about the peace that he gives and the peace that the world gives.
Let us see first to what Jesus said about the peace that the world gives. We may understand that what the world tells us about peace is the normalcy of life or ‘business-as-usual.’ This means that we go and proceed to what we usually do in life by doing what we want and by satisfying our needs and desires. But is it really peace at all?
The peace that the world gives is shallow and remains self-centered. This peace focuses on our ego. But then, when the ego is not satisfied then the promised peace is lost because worries and anxieties will overwhelm us again.
However, the peace Jesus gives is something different. This peace is growing in confidence with God, with my brothers and sisters no matter who they are. Thus, this peace allows us to see and recognize our brothers and sisters. This peace breaks any form of division, discrimination and indifference.
This goes beyond to what is physical but into our hearts, in believing and becoming confident that God is with us and that God never abandons us. This peace sips through our troubled life, even into our stressful work or ministry, and into our un-reconciled relationships, into our danger-filled surrounding brought by covid-19, into the many displacements and halting of our so-called normal life before the Covid-19, and into our anxieties of what is to come tomorrow.
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Jesus gives us His Peace! This is Jesus’ gift to us. Are we ready to accept it? Are we willing to embrace it? Or do we prefer to just do our normal and usual things in life? To continue making ourselves submerged in worries and anxieties of life?
Jesus wants us to be free from the troubles of worries and anxieties, to be free from fears and hesitations. This is the reason why the Lord gives Himself to us so that we will have him and enjoy his peace.
Be confident that the Lord is with us; the Holy Spirit is among us and within us. By becoming confident in Jesus, we may also recognize the peace that others may bring into our lives. Hence, be welcoming also of the peace that our brothers and sisters may bring into our life.
A DOSE OF GOD TODAY 