This Sunday of Lent (the fourth already!) we have the
opportunity to reflect on a very important fact: God endowed man with wondrous
gifts to use to find him, but instead mankind hid behind the gifts and refused
to see or seek the Creator behind the creation[1].
The extent of man’s suffering the result of his own
actions still effects us as we experience the horrors that man inflicts upon
man, be they dictators or liberators, as we silently witness the death of
children from sickness and famine, as we experience the destruction of marriages
due to the impact of selfishness and materialism.
So, we call upon God during Lent to restore beauty to
his world. We call upon God to
teach us once more what true love is. And God answers with the simple sentence
that Jesus gave Nicodemus: For God so
loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him
might not perish but might have eternal life. My brother, my sister: love
is experienced, beauty is restored, order defeats chaos, and goodness conquers
sin through the Cross of Jesus Christ.
The power of God is greater than the machinations of
man. In today’s second reading Paul tells the Ephesians and us that God is rich
in mercy. He has tremendous love for us.
Even when we were dead in our transgressions, he brought us to life with
Christ.
The awesome love that was displayed on the cross is
the continual means of our salvation.
God has not thrown out his canvas. He is still completing his artwork. Only,
we must now be his paintbrushes. We have to paint over the smudge marks of hatred
with the Love of the Lord. We have to fill in the empty spots of selfishness
with sacrificial love. We have to turn from the glorification of materialism to
the determination to live the spiritual life given to us by the Passion, Death
and Resurrection of the Lord.
The restoration of God’s artwork began with Jesus, but
it must continue with us. Are we really ready and open for this? For God says, "At just the right time,
I heard you. On the day of salvation, I helped you." Indeed, the
"right time" is now. Today is the day of salvation[2]
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