God understands us best-HOMILY FOR THE 14TH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME JULY 2023

HOMILY FOR THURSDAY OF THE 13TH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

Genesis 22:1b-19; Ps.115; Matthew 9:1-8

God understands us best

The love of God far surpasses the love of men. In today’s gospel, Jesus attended to the paralytic man in the order of importance. The people around only understood the man to be paralyzed. Bringing him to Jesus, they expected Jesus to make him walk. Their understanding of the problem influenced their expectation. True to the words of scripture in Isaiah 55:8-9 that God’s ways and thoughts far exceeds that of man, Jesus understood the paralytic’s situation more holistically. The man was not just paralyzed, he was in need of salvation. His situation was as a result of sin. And so, the forgiveness of sins was first and most important.

Sin cannot be thought to produce lesser effect in man today. How often do we consider our standing with God when trying to find solutions to our problems? In his book titled “Called to Act in Persona Christi: Reflections on Priestly life and ministry”, Msgr. John Aniagwu noted that in the course of his pastoral ministry, when people come to him to complain that they are being troubled by evil spirits, or threatened by evil men or women, the first thing he does is to ask them how close they are to Jesus: how deep is their prayer life, when last they went for confession and received Holy Communion, how kind and charitable they have been to their fellow men and women especially the poor and the needy, how much they have practiced forgiveness and have amended their ways. If their answers are positive, he will tell them to go home and have a good sleep. The devil cannot touch them because they are well protected against him. Beloved, one with God is majority.

If we should examine ourselves with the above questions, I think we will complain less of God not answering our prayers. Most times, it is rather we who have not understood what God requires of us. Abraham understood this in the first reading and that is why he is called our Father in faith. He believed that God will provide and so nothing is too big to give up for the sake of God.

God loves us and is always ready to give us the best. But we need to have the mind of God in order to understand His working in our lives. If we are far away from God, we cannot understand how He loves us. Thus, our first goal in prayer should be that God will make our hearts like His. Dear friends in Christ, our most dependable stronghold is the love of God.