Faithful and Generous

Homily for Saturday of the 4th Week in Lent

Jeremiah and Jesus are both the victims of plots against their lives.

Jeremiah was called by God to prophesy to a dying nation. He was only a teenager when he was called. We know that the elders of his nation refused to listen and plotted to take his life on several occasions. 

In today’s Gospel we hear how the people of Jerusalem reacted to Jesus. Some thought he was the prophet of whom Moses had written. Others thought him to be the Messiah. Still others simple refused to believe in him because of ignorance about his birth.

Neither Jeremiah nor Jesus shirked from the vocation they had received from God. Perhaps this is the lesson we are to take away from the Scriptures today. From the earliest days of our covenant with God, God has blessed us through the ministry of Jesus with faithful and generous hearts who witness has yielded a bountiful harvest through their perseverance. As our mindfulness trigger today, I would suggest that we keep in mind the faithful and generous hearts we have known in our own lifetime.

As they did, so we must do. Jesus gives us his very self as food to strengthen us in our resolve to follow him and to preach his Gospel through the example of our lives.