CHARACTERISTICS OF OUR NEW LIFE: (3. ABILITY TO HEAL AND TO UNDERSTAND THE SCRIPTURES). (Homily for March 30, 2016. Easter Wednesday.)


Bible Study: Acts 10, 1 to 10 and Luke 24, 13 to 35.


Going through our readings this morning, we can see that a lot went into the training of the disciples of Jesus before they became Great Apostles. In Mark chapter 9, we read about an embarrassing episode wherein a man brought his son to the disciples of Jesus for healing because the boy was possessed with an evil spirit but they couldn’t. Surprisingly, as we see in our first reading this morning, Peter and John met a crippled man by the Beautiful Gate who was begging for alms and they decided to give him the best gift ever; the gift of his healing.

So what happened? In between that time the disciples could not even work a single miracle and were scared to death when they faced difficulties and this time when they could boldly heal a man crippled from birth, they had to be schooled further. And one occasion of this further studies took place in our Gospel passage. Two disciples of Jesus were going away from Jerusalem to a village called Emmaus. They had heard about the resurrection of Jesus but instead of them to go to Galilee as the women instructed, they turned their backs away and were going to Emmaus disappointed.

The case of this two disciples represents so many Christians today. These disciples like most of us today were expecting that Jesus had come to take over earthly power from the Romans, they were expecting that they would someday be in charge of cities as Governors in Jesus’ Presidential cabinet. Don’t we also have such mundane expectations of God? Haven’t we turned the bible into some sort of magic wand for material prosperity whereby everything we read in there is interpreted in the context of God making us rich and giving us power to possess things in the world?

It took Jesus a whole day to explain the Scriptures to them and their hearts burned within them while he spoke. In the end, their eyes were opened to the understanding that it was NECESSARY for Jesus to suffer. And the fact that we suffer should not become an obstacle to our faith. The fact that we do not have all the money in the world or that we are not ruling as earthly kings does not mean that God is powerless. We must have faith that the God who raised Christ from the dead is with us despite whatever challenges we may be facing in life. And so long as we have faith while we pray for healing, we should be fully expectant of seeing results.  

Let us Pray:
Lord Jesus, make me an instrument of your healing to everyone I meet today and give me wisdom to understand when I read the Bible. Amen.


God bless you. Good morning. Be Happy. Live Positive. Have Faith. It is well with you. Please say one “Our Father” and one “Hail Mary” for me that God continues to use me in this ministry of spreading the word as mark my birthday today. 

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