Holy Spirit of God, help me sow righteousness, reap steadfast love, and break up fallow ground…

 
Hosea 10:1-12

 
Being a ‘friend of God’ through all of life’s challenges is not a passive pursuit; it takes deliberate and committed choices and actions that are true to our Father’s will. Just as the Israelites of Hosea’s day had fallen away from exercising their Jewish faith, had pursued foreign gods, and had fallen in love with their own plans, powers, and projects of the world, so it is for us today. As a result of godless and faithless living, news flashes seem to become increasingly bizarre, systems and institutions are being derailed by increasingly complex digitization, and even nature seems to be confronting human hubris. God’s remedy for these times? Like the Israelites in Hosea’s time, and Like Jesus in Roman times, as faithful children of God, we are called to sow righteousness, reap steadfast love, and break up fallow ground. To actively sow righteousness, I need to think through the ethical and moral intent and implications of my words and actions, always considering God’s laws of Truth in Love and Love in Truth (cf John Paul II).  Deliberately reaping steadfast love implies that I consciously look for ways to extend God’s mercy to others through all conversations, propositions, circumstances. And ‘breaking up fallow ground’ requires that I have the courage to ‘stir up’ social norms and behavior patterns that are darkening or freezing human hearts, with despondency and despair through my own sacrifices of joy and thanksgiving to the glory of God. Do I understand enough about my heritage as a child of God to actively practice the righteousness and steadfast love of God, and deliberately break up the wastelands of hard heartedness? Holy Spirit of God, help me sow righteousness, reap steadfast love, and break up fallow ground. 
  
Those who are wise understand these things; those who are discerning know the,. but transgressors stumble in them.    (Hosea 14:9)
 
Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies.
St. Mother Teresa of Kalcutta
 
Soli ad gloriam Dei
Gospel Mystery of the Day on FaceBook & www.gospelmysteryoftheday.ca