Holy Spirit of God, help me hear your voice without prejudice ...

Matthew 13:54-58

It is my own assumptions and expectations, that lead to my misunderstanding, if not dismissal, of God’s words. Like the people from Jesus’ home town, my own preconceived notions and self-talk can make so much noise that I cannot ‘see’ past my own prejudices about an individual, particularly someone familiar to me, and cannot hear any Word the Lord may be speaking through them to me.    Similarly if I am convinced that my own expectations and vision of the God’s servants is the correct one, like the people of Nazareth who dismissed Jesus, I may miss anyone who comes to me in the Name of the Lord, simply because they do not match my own image of God.  Am I willing to suspend my own assumptions and expectations, my own prejudices and visions, in order to open my heart to the coming of the Holy Spirit of God in another person? Holy Spirit, help me hear your voice without prejudice.
 
O that today you would listen to his voice! Harden not your hearts as in the provocation, as in the day when your ancestors tempted me.  (Psalm 95:7-9)
 
To become a friend of Jesus, is to become a friend of the excluded. As we learn to be a friend of the excluded, we enter to into this amazing relationship, that is friendship with God.  
Jean Vanier
 
www.gospelmysteryoftheday.ca  & Gospel Mystery of the Day on Facebook
 
Soli ad gloriam Dei