7th Sunday in Ordinary Time (A)

INTRO:

Most people prefer doing EASY over doing DIFFICULT. This is so natural.

But in the life of a CHRISTIAN, a CATHOLIC, and a follower of JESUS …… we are expected to do DIFFICULT!

We are supposed to do the challenging acts of loving all of our neighbors, good and bad, and of those who persecute us!

And what about those, as Jesus says, who are our enemies??? We are supposed to LOVE OUR ENEMIES, too!!!!

This is very interesting to live this way.
So, sounds like at times, the demands of the Gospel can feel incredibly burdensome and difficult.
And for us to be like God, who loves the unlovable and the dysfunctional, we must do the same.

Here we have in these current times, the dysfunctional and unlovable who senselessly murder and what are we to do with this???

And yet, Jesus insists that
His yoke is “easy” and
His burden “light”.

Likewise, elsewhere in John’s Gospel, he insists that God’s commandments are not burdensome. And if a Christian feels that they are, then we are relying solely on our own strength to carry them out, not God’s.

And that’s the key to loving our enemies and persecutors!!

We cannot rely on our own strength or abilities to take whatever our enemies, persecutors do to us!

CONCLUSION

Here we are reminded that we are a people who have been given new life through our baptism and likewise strengthened in the Sacrament of CONFIRMATION to allow GOD
YES Allow God
To work through us in this difficult way of living: TO LOVE OUR ENEMIES, whoever we consider them to be.

That’s how Christ was able to say:
“Father forgive them, for they know not what they do!”

I believe all of us can do the same!