Tuesday,
December 9, 2014
2nd Week of Advent
1st Reading: Is 40:1-11
Gospel: Mt 18:12-14
Jesus said to his disciples, “What do you think of this? If someone has a hundred sheep and one of them strays, won’t he leave the ninety-nine on the hillside, and go to look for the stray one? And I tell you: when he finally finds it, he is more pleased about it than about the ninety-nine that did not get lost. It is the same with your Father in heaven: there they don’t want even one of these little ones to be lost.”
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the Assimilated Life Experience)
In its September 15, 2003 issue, The Philippine Daily Inquirer published this news item: “Australia has offered to give away 57,000 live sheep to an unnamed country in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia rejected the shipment on health grounds, Trade Minister Mark Vaile said Sunday. Animal rights activists had demanded that the sheep be put down, claiming 3,400 of them had died after being stranded for 5 weeks in searing temperatures on the vessel dubbed as ship of death. Saudi Arabia refused to take the sheep last month after veterinarians found 6% of the sheep were suffering from the disease scabby mouth.”
The story of the sheep is our story in reverse. Instead of rejecting all of us for our spiritual devaluation due to sin God launched an ambitious salvation mission by sending a Shepherd willing to leave the 99 in search for the lost ones. What happened to the sheep that were rejected by Saudi Arabia cannot happen to us because we have been marked as God’s own at Baptism.
But our story makes a significant diversion in that we aren’t as docile as sheep, for we have minds of our own. This is bad when it gets to the level of stubbornness. We have reasons to believe it has come to this level. Many refuse to be led by the Shepherd, insisting on their right to independence. The independence pursued, however, is independence from the rule of the Spirit. Any independence that veers away from the guidance of the Holy Spirit leads to slavery. This is really dangerous since invocation of personal freedom disarms God. His great respect for freedom will leave us where we are. God is no trespasser of hearts but a great respecter of one’s privacy.
We can end up like the sheep rejected by Saudi Arabia if we refuse allow God to carry us back to the fold. That mark we received at Baptism cannot override our freedom. In this season of Advent let us be attentive to the voice of the Shepherd in search of us. Let us run to his arms and allow him as he takes us back to the fold. —Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM. Email: [email protected]. Website:www.frdan.org.
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