Reflection for August 31, Thursday of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time: Matthew 24:42-51

Gospel: Matthew 24:42-51

Jesus said to his disciples: “Stay awake! For you do not know on which day your Lord will come. Be sure of this: if the master of the house had known the hour of night when the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and not let his house be broken into. So too, you also must be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come. 

“Who, then, is the faithful and prudent servant, whom the master has put in charge of his household to distribute to them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master on his arrival finds doing so. Amen, I say to you, he will put him in charge of all his property. 

But if that wicked servant says to himself, ‘My master is long delayed,’ and begins to beat his fellow servants, and eat and drink with drunkards, the servant’s master will come on an unexpected day and at an unknown hour and will punish him severely and assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.”

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Reflection:

Are you afraid to die? 

Death is like a thief in the night it comes when we least expect it. There are even people who are healthy who suddenly die without any apparent reason. That’s life it can be taken from us anytime for we don’t own it we simply are stewards of this life that we have. 

 In the gospel Jesus oddly compared the Lord to a thief who comes unexpectedly. Maybe He did this to inculcate into the stubborn minds of some of His followers the value of always doing good so that if they unexpectedly die they can still be with Him in heaven. 

This is a wake up call to all of us to change our ways for the better. Let us always remember that we too are walking on this earth on borrowed time. Our life can be taken from us anytime thus it is a must that we are always ready by doing good and by detesting sin. 

God has given us this temporary life and eventually at His appointed time He will take it away from us. We therefore have to always be prepared for we really do not know our time of departure from this world. Only God knows, God gives and God takes. 

What are you doing with your life right now? – Marino J. Dasmarinas