God's Word Is Fulfilled In Our Hearing ~ by Ronnie Archer

Third Sunday in Ordinary Time






In today's First Reading from Nehemiah, as well as in the Gospel of Luke, we hear the WORD being proclaimed to the men, women and the children who were old enough to understand, as they stood in unity. In the First Reading, the people were weeping as they heard Ezra reading from the book of the law of GOD. He told them "do not be saddened this day, for rejoicing in the Lord must be your strength!"

The people had a hard time with the fact that today, the Scripture is fulfilled.

As the people in Ezra's days were, we are people who are living in hope all of the time, but we are uncomfortable with that hope in the Scriptures being fulfilled... today! We're more comfortable with "tomorrow," when we hear something related to the fulfillment of God's Word today!

We are many parts of the one Body of Christ; and we can be happy today and live in unity when we realize who we are and that the Word is with us.

Even though we are individual parts of that one Body of Christ, it is also important to understand our uniqueness. Society sometimes calls us to be like others, but we must realize that even though we comprise one Body, each of us has different gifts. God created each "part" with its own purpose and we should be accepting of, and have respect for, the importance of the gifts of each other.

Unity and love go together, and bring joy to Christ, so when we know our own gifts, we can contribute to others. We must pray to overcome the fear we might feel when we place ourselves out of our "comfort zone," for fear is the root of all evil.

"Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing." (Luke 4:21)