Preparation for Total Consecration

WEEK 4:
KNOWLEDGE OF OUR LORD

The New Testament is largely the result of the impact made on the early Church by the risen Jesus; he is Lord. In that light they were 'christened' - baptised into his Church, and there contemplated and tried to live his teaching. We, like them, should want to enjoy a present relationship with our risen Lord as reflected in the Gospel.

First Day: Mk. 12: 1-9

MISSED OPPORTUNITIES

Parable.A man planted a vineyard ... let it out to tenants, and went into another country. When the time came, he sent a servant to the tenants, to get ... some of the fruit of the vineyard. And they ... beat him and sent him away empty-handed ... Another servant was treated shamefully ... and so with many others ... He still had one other, a beloved Son ... He sent him to them, saying 'They will respect my son'. But those tenants ... killed him. What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants, and give the vineyard to others.

Reflection.There were many big estates with absentee landlords in Galilee in Jesus' day, with all the problems of such a situation. But that is a surface glimpse of a deeper reality. The prophets of Israel, speaking for God while trying to tend the vine he had planted, were so often rejected and personally made to suffer for uttering an unwelcome word.

Jesus, the 'beloved Son', knows himself to be part of that same tradition, and his eyes were wide open to what that might mean when he said, 'Those tenants killed him'.

The authorities who rejected the prophets and Jesus were not necessarily bad or irreligious. But their understanding of God could not square with his. They had become blinkered, had developed tunnel-vision, so sure in their understanding of how God's people should live. Challenged by Jesus, who saw so differently, their reaction was violent and predictable.

Can I imagine how hard Jesus must have found it to breathe in so suffocating an atmosphere? How frightening at times he found it? How hard it must have been to provoke such bitterness when Jesus' sole motivation was love! How sad to see people misled!

How open am I to hear the authentic word of God? Am I prepared to go to the stake for what I believe? Only in so far as I know and trust my strong, risen Lord will I find the strength to follow where he leads.

Prayer.Lord Jesus, in part, your parables provoked your death. I have to believe that the reaction to your word today can be as frightening.

May the presence and prayers of your Mother, superbly receptive to your word, wherever it might lead, encourage me first to listen, then receive what you have to say to me, and not to be afraid of the challenge.

Montfort.'Whoever, then, wishes to advance along the road to holiness and to be sure of encountering the true Christ, without fear of the illusions which afflict many devout people, should take up ... this devotion to Mary ... opened up by Jesus Christ, the incarnate Wisdom' (TD 168).