LENTEN REFLECTION – The Fifth Week – 6 April 2017
Come to us, free us, help us and guide us.
We pray more intensely now, just a week before Holy Thursday.
We desire more and more that we might be free.
Sorrow leads to profound gratitude,
when we experience the depth of unconditional love offered us.
The gratitude of a loved sinner leads to great generosity.
Christ is the mediator of a new covenant so that since he has died,
those who are called may receive the eternal inheritance promised to them.
The Entrance Antiphon – Hebrews 9:15
What an exquisitely beautiful things is this loving, painstaking Providence of God!
A fatherly care that can turn even our sins to good use!
I think what hurts us most in our sins and our mistakes is the awful feelings of guilt they bring – and the terrible sense of waste.
“If only I could do it all over again!” we say with remorse. “If only I could undo the harm I’ve done, soothe the feelings I’ve hurt, straighten out the mess I’ve made!”Lord, what a joy to know that through Your Death and Resurrection, through Your Father’s loving care, the harm is already undone!
That once we are sorry for our sins, there is never any waste.
All, all is turned to good.
Your wisdom can straighten what my sins have entangled, through the love You gave us in sending Your only Son to die.
Your Providence can take the broken pieces of my life and mend them – and make me into a saint!
I look forward now, my Lord, not back.
Take me – I abandon myself to a new life in Him who will die for my sins but will rise again!
From Meditations on St Paul by Fr James E Sullivan M.S.
AnaStpaul 