A Call to Repentance

03-24-2019Weekly ReflectionFr. Julius Kundi

St. Francis of Assisi once invited a young friar to go with him into town to preach. Francis and the young friar spent all day walking through the streets and then came home. When the day’s journey was done, the young friar was disappointed and asked “Weren’t we supposed to preach today?” Francis replied, “Son, we have preached. We were preaching while we were walking. We were seen by many and our behavior was noted. It is of no use walking anywhere to preach unless we preach wherever as we walk!” He summed up his idea in these words “Preach the Gospel everywhere, and if necessary, use words.” To him witnessing to Jesus wasn’t merely quoting some words out of the Bible from time to time but one who lives by the word of God each day.

Lent basically is a season of growth and maturation in the faith. This is what God and the Church hope to harvest at the Paschal Feast. Increase in faith and holiness, increase in membership through spiritual rebirth and increase in love for God and others. Yes, Easter will invite us to a life of witnessing to the fact of the resurrection which has to be practical for all to see.

The gardener in today's Gospel asked the owner of the vineyard to give the barren fig tree another chance to produce fruit. He promised to dig around it and manure it, to give it one last chance to prove itself. This practically suggests that we too need to nurture our faith as individuals and as a Church so as to bear the kind of fruit God wants from us before He returns. We can only achieve this by seriously considering the invitation to repentance which is the main theme of today's readings.

Today, we celebrate the Lord who frees us from our slavery to sin, if only we listen to His warning to repent. St. Paul in the second reading gives us a kind reminder of the consequences of deliberately going contrary to God’s will. He carefully traced the death of the Israelites to their inability to please God. That is to say, because they sinned against God. Hence, Paul concluded by warning us that: “All these happened as a warning, and it was written down to be a lesson for us who are living at the end of the age.”

In today’s gospel, Jesus was very direct in his words when he said: “Unless you repent you will perish.” One might say that this is too harsh to come from Christ who is merciful and compassionate. The truth is that when Jesus speaks this way, it does not diminish his compassion and mercy. Rather, he does so because he actually cares for us and sees what we cannot see. He simply warns us of the negative consequences of living a sinful life and wants us to repent and live a better life.

The Gospel reminds us that we have time on this earth to change our lives. We celebrate a God of second chance who expects us to use the time well. This should not be seen as a threat, but an invitation. It's to the glory of God the Father if we bear much fruits. The Kingdom of God becomes a reality in our midst if we bear fruits of holiness.

Let us therefore ask today for this grace of desiring change in our lives as we open ourselves to the leadership of God through His Word so that when he returns He will harvest abundantly from our lives.

Fr. Julius

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