Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent (March 20, 2018): Have any complaints?

Today’s Readings:

Numbers 21:4-9
Ps 102:2-3, 16-21
John 8:21-30
www.usccb.org/bible/readings/032018.cfm

USCCB Podcast of the Readings:
ccc.usccb.org/cccradio/NABPodcasts/18_03_20.mp3

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to John.

Jesus said to the Pharisees:
“I am going away and you will look for me,
but you will die in your sin.
Where I am going you cannot come.”
So the Jews said,
“He is not going to kill himself, is he,
because he said, ‘Where I am going you cannot come’?”
He said to them, “You belong to what is below,
I belong to what is above.
You belong to this world,
but I do not belong to this world.
That is why I told you that you will die in your sins.
For if you do not believe that I AM,
you will die in your sins.”
So they said to him, “Who are you?”
Jesus said to them, “What I told you from the beginning.
I have much to say about you in condemnation.
But the one who sent me is true,
and what I heard from him I tell the world.”
They did not realize that he was speaking to them of the Father.
So Jesus said to them,
“When you lift up the Son of Man,
then you will realize that I AM,
and that I do nothing on my own,
but I say only what the Father taught me.
The one who sent me is with me.
He has not left me alone,
because I always do what is pleasing to him.”
Because he spoke this way, many came to believe in him.

Good News Reflection: Have any complaints?

Think of the “pharisees” in your life, the unteachable people who are so sure they’re right that their pride blinds them to their errors and sins. We all have some degree of phariseeism in our thoughts.

Humility is the cure — taking an honest look at our fallibility to discover how we have strayed from God’s will so that our Lenten journey brings us back to him.

In today’s first reading, the Israelites realized that their straying began when they complained. Pride tells us that it’s right to complain because we know (as if we’re God) that life should be perfect. Pride tells us that suffering is proof that we should grumble and complain rather than praise God. Pride makes us impatient for the Promised Land, which we will not reach unless we do a lot of growing first.

Growth is a product of suffering. Complaints are a product of pride.

The Israelites were saved from their pride when God provided a tool of repentance, the bronze serpent mounted on a pole, which foreshadowed the crucifixion of the Messiah. The serpent represented their sins, just as Jesus would one day accept all the world’s sins upon himself and be “mounted” on the cross and raised up for all to see.

In today’s Gospel passage, the Pharisees are so sure they have the right understanding of God that they fail to recognize Jesus as their long-awaited Messiah. When people justify sins by claiming that that are hearing God correctly, they become offensive whenever their understanding is challenged by reality. How do you handle this? Do you complain?

Analyze what you’re saying when you complain. Complaining about people means we’re condemning them. Complaining about a situation is condemning the God who allowed the situation to occur.

Look at how Jesus handled the Pharisees. He longed for them to hear and accept the truth. He could have complained about them, but instead he rested in the fact that the day would come when the truth would speak for itself.

If you feel like complaining, take your complaints to God and only to God; he understands your frustrations better than everyone else. Go to friends for good counsel, but don’t drag them into the fray by making them complain, too.

When we vent our anger to God alone, our complaints dissolve into his mercy. We lose interest in complaining. We are healed. We find peace. Does that happen when you vent with your friends?

Join me in making one more sacrifice for Lent. Let’s sacrifice our complaints. Let’s nail our complaining nature to the cross. Let’s take a vow of silence rather than allow complaints to escape from our lips. God will resurrect us into a new life of peace and joy that lasts even when things go wrong.

Today’s Prayer:

Good Father, forgive me for my complaints. When I complain, I believe that I know more about life than You do. Teach me how to recognize Your path in my everyday circumstances. Amen.

© 2018 by Terry A. Modica

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