A Reflection from the Fuel Daily Readings App for the 31st Sunday of Ordinary Time. Click here to read the reading.
Love is the engine of life. In our Gospel today, one of the teachers of the law questions Jesus on which of the laws is the greatest.
In response, Jesus began to draw his audience to a deeper appreciation of the Jewish Shema: “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength” (Deuteronomy 6:5).
Jesus went further with the Shema. He said that this love of God should be expressed in the love of one another, and this is the foundation of our being.
We are created to love and to live in love. God is love, and anyone who lives in love lives in God. The flow happening between the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit is the flow of love. This love is expressed in the Genesis poem; let us make man in our own image and likeness; an expression of love seeking to overflow. Humanity became the result of that overflow of love. No wonder God’s love for us is unconditional… we are born out of love.
The Jewish Shema is a reminder of that love. However, since we are created in the image and likeness of God, Jesus calls us to the real expression of God’s love by asking us to love our neighbour. Jesus believes that if we can love our neighbour, we are in that way expressing our love for God.
In today’s society, it is very challenging for us to love. This is partly because we have lost the meaning of love in our world. It is also because we live in a world that celebrates individualism over community. In effect, we love people that love us and hate those who don’t love us. Our love is conditioned to our tribes and people we believe we can get along with. And yet, God has called us to go beyond the tribal expression of love, to a kind that is encompassing. This is hard to do, but it is our call to be an instrument of love in our world. In our little way, we let the energy at the core level of our being help us to see the Divine in each person that we might encounter. Bishop Robert Barron said that love is willing the good of the other for the other. Not for yourself, but for the other.
So, as you go about your business this week, demand yourself to love people the way they are. See the Divine in them. It will help you to see things in different hues of colours, and only then will you realize that there is the Divine Spirit animating in all things; the power of Christ working through all, in all and with all.
+ God, you have called us in love. Help us to love one another, to rid ourselves of jealousy, envy and selfishness. In all the ways we cling to our selfish way of love, we pray that you expand our horizon and help us to grow, expand and to see you in every person in our lives. Amen.