7th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A By Tobe Eze

7th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A

FIRST READING
Leviticus 19:1—2, 17—18

SECOND READING
1 Corinthians 3:16—23

GOSPEL
Matthew 5:38—48

THEME: WE ALL ARE FOR CHRIST.

Christ is God and God is Holy. If we are for Christ, that means, we should be Holy. Holiness is not doing extraordinary things but doing ordinary things in an extraordinary way.

How do we do ordinary things in an extraordinary way? Do everything in love and with love. Once we put love first in everything we do, we are doing them in an extraordinary way. Love should be in the centre of our lives. Christ is God and God is love, so we should also be love. Where love abides holiness lives in full there. Holiness of spirit and body. We are to be Holy for our heavenly father is Holy. When we say that he is Holy, we are just limiting him to a point. He is Holiness itself. And we should be holy as his children.

St. Augustine propounded the theory of Rationale seminale that is. God left a genre in creatures that make them procreate their different species. A goat cannot beget a fish. If we are really children of God, and God is holy, he that is holy can only give birth to another who is holy, which means, we to be holy. Continue Reading

You have heard that it was said an eye for an eye. In Igbo setting, they normally say, Onye mere onye mere ya ihe ọjọ ihe ọjọ, n' ọbụrọ arụ. Jesus tells us today that it is a serious sin. (Mortal sin). Obu aru. Our number one problem is that we are now more interested in fighting our enemies in the Church more than praying to God. We are using go as a weapon to fight, which he is not and will not. We do not accept that we sin or we offend others. It is only others who offend us. When you go to different churches, what you will be hearing everywhere is Holy Ghost………………… Fire, fireeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. For what? To kill all the enemies, human being like us. Our only enemy is the devil recorded in the book of Revelation (11). Naming our fellow human being our enemies make us also enemies to them, so all of us are enemies to each other. If we notice that we all are enemies and work towards it, I think our world will be better. Pray for your enemies and that is doing ordinary things in an extraordinary way. It is the same prayer but in a way that many cannot say it. Many pray for the death of their so called enemies. I tell you, as you pray for other persons' death, others pray also for your own death. So the best option for us is to pray for people’s lives and good things to come their way so that others will pray for our own good. What is differentiating us from the pagans, if we pray for only ourselves and not others? Pagans will always say, God anyone who is after me let the person go to sleep and never wake up again. But Christ tells us today to give our spare parts to those who want to take the main one. We all know that it is not easy but we must do it for the sake of Heaven. It is better to suffer now and enjoy forever than to enjoy now and suffer forever.

Let us be Holy for our heavenly father is Holy. Paying evil with evil is not being holy. Living in the chapel, praying grounds and adoration grounds is never holiness. We only go there because we think that people are after us. We only go there because we have one problem or another. My bishop, Most Rev. Prof. Godfrey Igwebụike Ọnah said in his Lenten message 2014 we want to see Jesus, that there is difference between a child running to an elder's house because masquerade is after him/her and that the child prepares and go to visit an elder. The first, when the masquerade goes the child leaves but in the later the child will sit, discuss, learn, eat and drink in the elder's house. When we run to chapel, praying grounds and adoration grounds because we think someone or something is after us, when it seems like the problem is over we will leave. But when we go to him as our God that created us, many other blessings will follow it. After the visit, the child will thank the elder for his kind gestures and the elder will give the child more things to go with but in the other one, the child will leave without even telling the elder that he/she is leaving and nothing will be given to the child.

We are all for Christ. In Holiness not in sin. Forgive your neighbour and life will continue to go well with everyone. Anything you do, remember BE HOLY FOR YOUR HEAVENLY FATHER IS HOLY. BE HOLY FOR I AM HOLY. (Matthew 5:48. Leviticus 19:2), because it is only through Holiness that we can be for Christ.  HAPPY SUNDAY

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