God's Arm Will Help You

10-20-2019Weekly ReflectionFr. Julius Kundi

Most of us have experienced drowsiness when we try to pray. This can happen when we are dealing with distressing situations and God seems to delay attending to our intentions. The human side of us manifests, and often times ends in frustration and giving up praying completely. Moses, in today's first reading gets fatigued . He grew exceedingly weary holding up his arm in order to give Joshua victory over his enemies. He had to appeal to superior power for help in order to defeat the Amalekites.

Like the Israelites of the time of Moses we too are today in a mortal struggle with dangerous enemies that threaten to kill us. Our modern enemies include among many, deprivation, oppression, alienation, and aggression. To stay safe, we must do what God’s people did in the desert. We must engage in battle with the enemy, throwing the best of our forces into the struggle, and never given up until total victory is achieved. Imitating Moses, we must hold up our hands in prayer to the God who is our source of power and will give us strength.

The Scriptures give us much assurance of why we should not grow weary, "The Lord is your guardian; the Lord is your shade; he is beside you at your right hand.” This assures us that we have a God who rescues us from death and feeds us in time of famine. Our faith in that God should make it possible to fight with confidence against the social evils like poverty and war which often seem to have the better of the fight.

Today’s liturgy invites us to consider the necessity of perseverance in prayer, and the final success that this achieves.

With faith and persistence we must lift up our eyes to the mountains—to Calvary and the God who will guard us from all evil. We must pray always and not be wearied by our trials. As Paul exhorts in today’s Epistle, we need to remain faithful, to turn to the inspired Scriptures—given by God to train us in righteousness. The scriptures will reveal deeply to us the power of the Cross of Jesus as the new staff of God which will bring us the new liberation we are looking for especially from sin. We look up to the Cross of Jesus as it brings forth living waters from the body of Christ, the new Temple of God.

Therefore, keep praying and never giving up, for "The eternal God is your refuge,” Moses said. “Underneath are the everlasting arms” (Dt. 33:27).

Fr. Julius

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