Your word is a lamp for my feet and a light for my path. (Psalm 119)
Mark 8:14-21 Yeasts of all kinds populate our environment and our bodies. Some yeast plants are helpful, raising dough to make delicious breads. But yeast infections of the body are often ‘silent’ and go undetected as minor discomforts until great damage has been done to skin and ear cells or to other organs of the body. In Jesus’ day, the Pharisees were like yeast – they were ubiquitous, and some did great good. But many of the Pharisees became self-righteous, critical and anything but holy, infecting individuals, families and groups of their communities because they appeared to be religious and were ‘successful’ – if only in powering over the common folk. As a member of the Church, I can still live like a Pharisee today, feasting on the goods of our present culture and then become infected with ‘yeast’ of stimulating events, delicious foods, tantalizing media bites, self-fashioned habits or the acquisition or production of ‘the arts’ working more to my own agenda and plans than seeking the will of God. Then, like all the other ‘Pharisees’ of ages past and present who posed as religious ‘authorities’ and success stories, my soul’s skin will become raw and inflamed and it will be difficult to find, let alone rest within, the holy peace and love of God. As these 40 days of Lent unfold, will I ‘feast’ with the Pharisees and contract the infections of yeast that affect those who follow the way of false religion? Or will I be wary of the yeasts – and the feasts – of the Pharisees, choosing instead to fast from the small and almost undetectable infections of self-will and self-empowerment? Holy Spirit of Jesus, help me beware of the yeast of the Pharisees. Happy are those whom you discipline, Lord, and whom you teach out of your law. (Psalm 94) A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it. G.K. Chesterton Soli ad gloriam Dei Gospel Mystery of the Day on FaceBook & www.gospelmysteryoftheday.ca
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AuthorBeverly Illauq lives in Kemptville, Ontario, where she greets each morning by seeking the Gospel Mystery of the Day - the Word of the Lord for direct and practical application to the specific challenges & joys of the day. Archives
March 2024
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