Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Reflection: Mathew 7:12-14

My life right now involves a lot of time driving. I'm staying at my parents' house which is a good hour and 20 minutes from where I work, so I-24 and I are pretty good buds.

I like to listen to the pray as you go podcast as I, er, go because it gets me in a good frame of mind for the rest of the day. Morning is by far my favorite time of day and I love starting it by hearing the Word and meditating on it.

Yesterday's reading was from the Gospel of Matthew, the rather famous verses about "do unto others" and the road to destruction being easy and the road to life being difficult.

“So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few." (Matthew 7:12-14)

We've heard it before, many times in our lives. "Do unto others what you would have them do to you." The danger in that is that it becomes a cliche that we stop hearing after a while. I have to make a conscious effort to remember that, to internalize it, and act on it. Do I treat others with compassion and kindness the way I want to be treated? I meet a lot of people in my line of work, both co-workers and customers. It's not unusual to meet a sour grape every now and then. I am sometimes a sour grape myself... but what I am called to do is to show God's loving kindness, his grace, to others, sour grape or not. 

It's easy to dismiss others, to not care, to treat them as less than. It's easy to get wrapped up in my own life, my own worries. It's easy to walk down the road of destructive tendencies, the ones that do not bring life and hope and joy. As Christians we must turn from this easy road and seek out the straight and narrow path (as my mother says). We know what we are called to do--do unto others as you would have them do to you--but actually walking that path can be difficult. Lucky for us, we don't walk it alone. God is with us when we stumble. 
May we all find the straight and narrow path and walk it humbly, with compassion, doing unto others as we would have them do to us. 

Grace & Peace,
Kathleen





3 comments:

  1. Just curious--what lectionary are you using?

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  2. The Pray as you Go podcast is done by the Jesuits, so I would assume they use a Catholic lectionary. If you know of a similar podcast that follows our lectionary I'd love to see it!

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  3. and by "our" lectionary I mean the Revised Common Lectionary...

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