The Spirit, through the prophet Isaiah, is today speaking to us about how we need to let the former things go and rather hold fast to the Lord, who is trying to do a new work in, for and through us; who alone can bring us to the safe harbour we desire through this desert pilgrimage called life.
The following Psalm, and the passage from St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians, seem to be appropriate responses to the Lord’s invitation. The more we come to know the Lord, to develop and deepen our personal relationship with him, to know his love and mercy towards us, the more should we be filled with that joy which the world cannot give, but which can only come through him. This should increasingly make us grow detached from the things of this world (the former things) in terms of our affections and desires. These are not the end-all and be-all of our being, of our stories.
These worldly affections and desires, I believe, are also often (along with our ill use of our own will in relation to these) the source of many of our deepest troubles and wounds in this life. And not only of our own troubles and wounds, as today’s Gospel startlingly shows; but they tend to hurt and involve others, whether directly or indirectly – the impact always being viscerally real.
Yet the good Lord, in his infinite compassion and condescension towards us, still extends to us his personal pardon, healing, and renewed freedom. But not freedom as an unlimited licence for all things, and certainly not to return to said former things. “Go and sin no more,” Jesus says to us, and in another place Scripture says, “do good works”.
The other lesson that I think is important for us to take away today is: just as we have been extended this hand from the Lord, so too should we (within reason) extend the same benefit to others, as opposed to hands filled with stones to enact a strict and stringent justice – under which we would also stand condemned, if we are truly honest with ourselves.
– Aaron Neiva