Gospel: Matthew 11:16-19
For John came neither eating nor drinking,
and they said, ‘He is possessed by a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating
and drinking and they said, ‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of
tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is vindicated by her works.”
+ + + + + + +
Reflection:
Whenever biographies of famous personalities are to be written. Publishers would try to make the exterior of the book as attractive as possible so that it would create an immediate exterior attraction to the buying public. Especially to those who have superficial knowledge of the personality involve.
Jesus was called names such as glutton, drunkard, friend of tax collectors and sinners by the Pharisees and scribes. Because that’s what they saw: Jesus talking and mingling with them, they based their unfair judgements on what they saw from Jesus. If only they knew that the real motive of Jesus was the conversion of tax collectors and sinners they would not have unfairly judged Him.
The same is true with John he was
labelled as someone who was possessed by a demon. Perhaps the reason behind
such unfair name calling was based on the physical appearance of John. And
John’s preference to live in the desert before coming out to prepare the way
for Jesus.
Oftentimes we are like the Pharisees and the scribes for we judge also based on what we see and hear about others. We base our judgment on the exterior and the superficial. But is this right? Of course not!
It’s not correct to throw judgment based on what we see or observe for what we see is a scant representation of the whole person. Let us know first the person before judging. And if there’s an opportunity to talk to him/her so that we could have a clearer picture of the person’s personality let us do so.
Are you sometimes quick
to judge? – Marino J. Dasmarinas
No comments:
Post a Comment