“The Kingdom of God will be given to a people producing its fruits,” said Jesus in today’s gospel reading. Here’s today’s reflection from the daily Mass.
BIBLE READINGS: You can find the readings for Friday of the Second Week of Lent can be found here
There are many famous speeches from history. Churchill’s “We will fight them on the beaches.” JFK’s “Ask not what you can do for your country, but what your country can do for you,” are just two.
Among the most famous is Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream,” speech delivered on the March to Washington for Jobs and Freedom in August 1963 becoming one of the most famous moments in the civil rights movement. Five years later he was shot dead on the balcony of his hotel a day after he delivered “I’ve been the mountaintop,” address.
In Genesis, the brothers of Joseph concoct a quick plan to kill him. As they see him approaching, “They said to one another, ‘Here comes this dreamer. Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits.” They are filled with jealousy, insecure of his position in the family, and how much his father loves him and so they turn to murder. Similarly, the story told by Jesus tells another garish incident, when the son of the vineyard’s owner is killed by the tenants, pointing to his own future suffering and death.
We can dare to dream of a future which isn’t ‘pie in the sky’ or simple wishful thinking, but a reality based on the Kingdom of God. We can all too easily give up hope and give into those who have a very different vision of the world. Those whose dreams are based on selfish desires rather than the designs of God. Those who hold onto weapons of war and aggression or who take delight in disrupting what is good and honest. Those who are armed with derision and ridicule, undermining and taunting what is really possible if only we put our minds and hearts into it. It is not the easy path, but it is the the most fruitful and productive. Jesus said, “The Kingdom of God will be given to a people producing its fruits.” The fulfilment of God’s Kingdom has already begun, and it takes root in the fruits we produce, in the dreams we have.
Mass today is at S Saviour’s Church at 10am.
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