Tuesday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Title

God’s Plan or Ours?

Outline

I have noticed that we often think we know how God has to act

It may be that we believe we need a revival and expect God to act like this or that revival in our past experience or tradition

It may be that we believe someone or some group needs judgment and expect God to judge as he did in the past

There is great disillusionment when whatever it is does not happen - and more than a little rationalization and denial

But that is nothing new - it happened in the Bible

Moses is a miracle child

Born naturally, kept for natural reasons, and put in a basket in the river as a last hope against hope

God used the oppressor’s own daughter and his command to save Moses, bless his parents, and give Moses a good education

But somehow Moses was aware of his race and his sense of racial identity and personal privilege gave him the idea that he would be a deliverer in the way he knew how (he does not mention God, so we do not know if there was a sense of divine deliverance)

It did not work and Moses ends up in Midian for the second phase of his education and the people continue waiting for a generation

Jesus is a miracle worker

But his life is not about miracles, for the miracles are signs of his identity, often worked to create a discussion

He disappoints those who were at first excited, for he is not brining about the revival in the revolutionary way they expected - he is no Maccabee

Capernaum had perhaps expected to be the capital of the revolution, northern capital of the Messiah - it will end up a ruin

Meanwhile, Gentiles, who have to revival to expect, will have an easier judgment and will eventually outnumber ethnic Jews in the kingdom

So it is with the Church today

We tend to think that God has to work through our gifts

We tend to think that God has to work in our time

We tend to think that God has to work as he did with Benedict or Francis or Dominic or the Jesuits or the neo-Pentecostal movement or something else from the past

But we do not ask God and listen, we forget that God rarely works the same type of revival twice, and we suppress the idea that judgment is often the prelude to context for revival

Meanwhile, those outside the community are experiencing Jesus in the here and now while we get out noses bloodied by running into walls

Jesus understood this; Moses experienced this; our generation needs to learn from them

Readings

Catholic Daily Readings 7-13-2021: Tuesday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time

FIRST READING

Exodus 2:1–15a

1 Now a man of the house of Levi married a Levite woman, 2 and the woman conceived and bore a son. Seeing what a fine child he was, she hid him for three months. 3 But when she could no longer hide him, she took a papyrus basket, daubed it with bitumen and pitch, and putting the child in it, placed it among the reeds on the bank of the Nile. 4 His sister stationed herself at a distance to find out what would happen to him.

5 Then Pharaoh’s daughter came down to bathe at the Nile, while her attendants walked along the bank of the Nile. Noticing the basket among the reeds, she sent her handmaid to fetch it. 6 On opening it, she looked, and there was a baby boy crying! She was moved with pity for him and said, “It is one of the Hebrews’ children.” 7 Then his sister asked Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and summon a Hebrew woman to nurse the child for you?” 8 Pharaoh’s daughter answered her, “Go.” So the young woman went and called the child’s own mother. 9 Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse him for me, and I will pay your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed him. 10 When the child grew, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses; for she said, “I drew him out of the water.”

11 On one occasion, after Moses had grown up, when he had gone out to his kinsmen and witnessed their forced labor, he saw an Egyptian striking a Hebrew, one of his own kinsmen. 12 Looking about and seeing no one, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. 13 The next day he went out again, and now two Hebrews were fighting! So he asked the culprit, “Why are you striking your companion?” 14 But he replied, “Who has appointed you ruler and judge over us? Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses became afraid and thought, “The affair must certainly be known.” 15 When Pharaoh heard of the affair, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to the land of Midian. There he sat down by a well.

RESPONSE

Psalm 69:33

33 “See, you lowly ones, and be glad;

you who seek God, take heart!

PSALM

Psalm 69:3, 14, 30–31, 33–34

3 I have sunk into the mire of the deep,

where there is no foothold.

I have gone down to the watery depths;

the flood overwhelms me.

14 But I will pray to you, LORD,

at a favorable time.

God, in your abundant kindness, answer me

with your sure deliverance.

30 But here I am miserable and in pain;

let your saving help protect me, God,

31 That I may praise God’s name in song

and glorify it with thanksgiving.

33 “See, you lowly ones, and be glad;

you who seek God, take heart!

34 For the LORD hears the poor,

and does not spurn those in bondage.

GOSPEL ACCLAMATION

Psalm 95:8

8 Do not harden your hearts as at Meribah,

as on the day of Massah in the desert.

GOSPEL

Matthew 11:20–24

20 Then he began to reproach the towns where most of his mighty deeds had been done, since they had not repented. 21 “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have repented in sackcloth and ashes. 22 But I tell you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you. 23 And as for you, Capernaum:

‘Will you be exalted to heaven?

You will go down to the netherworld.’

For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. 24 But I tell you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom on the day of judgment than for you.”

Notes

Catholic Daily Readings 7-13-2021: Tuesday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time

TUESDAY, JULY 13, 2021 | ORDINARY TIME

TUESDAY OF THE FIFTEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

YEAR 1 | ROMAN MISSAL | LECTIONARY

On the same date: Saint Henry

First Reading Exodus 2:1–15a

Response Psalm 69:33

Psalm Psalm 69:3, 14, 30–31, 33–34

Gospel Acclamation Psalm 95:8

Gospel Matthew 11:20–24

GREEN