SIXTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
A Happy Valentine’s Sunday to all our young couples – to those preparing for marriage and to those who are recently married!
– The Two Ways –
‘Look, today I am offering you life and prosperity, death and disaster. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God … if you love the Lord your God and follow his ways, if you keep his commandments, his laws and his customs, you will live …’ (Deut 30:15ff)
‘If you wish, you can keep the commandments, to behave faithfully is within in your power. God has set fire and water before you; put out your hand to whichever you prefer. Man has life and death before him; whichever a man likes better will be given him.’ (Eccles 15:15-17)
Since the will of God is that we follow his commandments and so have life, why do we balk at doing precisely that? Why pick and choose which of the Ten Commandments or which of Jesus’ teachings we are going to follow?
We know by reasoning and from experience that the Highway Code is there for our good and the good of all who travel by road, and that to ignore those road signs is to put our own life and that of others at risk! Similarly, to ignore the commandments of God is to put our own life and that of others at risk.
No wonder the Psalmist tells us today: “They are happy whose life is blameless, who follow God’s law! They are happy those who do his will, seeking him with all their hearts. You have laid down your precepts to be obeyed with care. May my footsteps be firm to obey your statutes. Bless your servant and I shall live and obey your word. Open my eyes that I may consider the wonders of your law. Teach me the demands of your statutes and I will keep them to the end. Train me to observe your law, to keep it with my heart.”
Fr Philip Sainter
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