FRIDAY MARCH 8, 2024
FRIDAY OF THE THIRD WEEK OF LENT B
Hosea 14:1-9
Mark 12:28-34
LOVING GOD ABOVE ALL
The prophet Hosea calls us in this Lenten season to return to the Lord. Not just abandoning our sinful ways, not just making reparations, not just practicing virtues and trying to make amends but properly returning to the Lord and giving our God our everything, our entire Love.
Indeed, it is only in total submission to God that we will gain the healing, the strength and the fortitude to march on in life.
And the Love of God overwhelms us if we actually begin to understand our roots and trace it back to God. Then will our lives flourish, and our strength renewed and our happiness will be full.
In the gospel, Jesus brings us to the same question of the essence of our lives. What is the greatest commandments? What are we to do when we return to God, abandon everything and trace our steps back to God. What is our obligations and where do we pay it? The Scribe that asks this question understands the many distractions in life and the many altars seeking our loyalties. To whom must we pay attention most.
Jesus gives a direct and deep answer. It is to God alone that we must give our whole heart, soul, mind and strength. And then complete it by expressing it to human beings around us, that is, love of Neighbour.
How can we love God with all our hearts, with all our souls, with all our mind and with all our strength? The heart is the seat of feelings and emotions. It is the heart that all emotional feelings flow from. All must be directed towards God. In God is the supreme emotional feelings of compassion, mercy, love and great affection. This must moderate our life in relationship with others. Such emotional feelings of hatred, resentment, hurtfulness and revenge are never of God. So loving God with our hearts demand expressing great emotions of affection, compassion and mercy to God and Neighbour.
Loving God with our soul means seeking great spiritual growth and strength above everything else in our lives. The soul is immortal, spiritual and eternal. To love God therefore is paying attention to the hunger in our souls, purifying our souls, and seeking to making our souls more spiritual and paying attention to it.
Loving God with our minds is seeking and sourcing greater knowledge and truth in existence. Gaining wisdom, seeking higher knowledge of God and delighting in the knowledge and wisdom of God.
Our strength is what drives your passion and aims in life. Our passion should be to please God alone and that should drive everything we do.
And the inseparable love of God and neighbour is highlighted in the commandments of God. The love we hold for God must find expression in the neighbour around us. We cannot lay claim to love God without implicitly loving our neighbour.
God our Father, you are love itself and your love overwhelms us. Help us to reciprocate this same love you hold for us towards you and our neighbour. Help us to dedicate our lives loving you with all our heart, soul, mind and strength and to show same love to our neighbour and gain the rewards of life, peace and happiness through Christ our Lord.
Fr Norbert Uchuno
