Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Reflection for April 9, Thursday within the Octave of Easter; Luke 24:35-48

Gospel: Luke 24:35-48
The disciples of Jesus recounted what had taken place along the way, and how they had come to recognize him in the breaking of bread. While they were still speaking about this, he stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost. Then he said to them, “Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have.” And as he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, he asked them, “Have you anything here to eat? They gave him a piece of baked fish; he took it and ate it in front of them.

He said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. And he said to them, “Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.”
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Reflection:
What is the requirement for us to grow in our faith life? We have to walk with our faith and not with our sight. 

There are truths in the teachings of the church that we only have to accept and believe by faith. We believe it because we have faith and we believe it because the church that we are in was founded by Jesus Himself through Peter.

In the gospel the disciples were initially unbelieving when Jesus appeared in their midst. Until Jesus conversed with them, ate baked fish in front of them and mentioned words from the scriptures to them. After which they finally believed that He had risen.

We can only guess the reason why they did not immediately believe. Perhaps it was lack of faith, perhaps the disciples were still in a state of shock due to the violent death of Jesus on the cross. Perhaps they interpreted the death of Jesus on the cross as the total defeat of Jesus because they saw no miracles while Jesus was on the cross.  

But they were with Jesus, they walked, ate and conversed with Him for three years. Thus they were supposed to already have faith in Him. Or perhaps their faith was only contingent on the miracles that Jesus did in-front of them for three years. They were used to seeing Jesus the miracle worker.

There are times that we will see no miracles when we hunger for miracles from Jesus. Nevertheless we must continue to hold-on to our faith in Him. No matter how dark the sky for after darkness comes light, after darkness comes the healing light of the morning sun. – Marino J. Dasmarinas 

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