Twenty-eighth Sunday Ordinary Time
October 9, 2022 •
In our lives - 99% of the time - this is how God will give you grace. This is how God will answer the prayers that you are lifting up to Him. Whatever you're asking. Whether it's a healing. A conversion. Virtue. Whatever it is that you're asking, God will give you that grace through your ordinary lives. Your ordinary vocations, and the humble obedience and fulfillment of those responsibilities.
Like Naaman, we can sometimes be tempted to think, "OK, I gotta pray a thousand rosaries to get this intention from God." Or "I have to go into the church and prostrate myself on the floor, and beat myself ten times a day for a year". Maybe God just wants a rosary. Just give Him one rosary. You don't have to overdo it.
Notice how He continually supports the laws of Israel.
Do you follow the laws of the Church? Do you keep asking Him for grace but disregarding the teachings and rules of His Church?
So often we ask God for special graces. I often ask people: Well, when was the last time you went to confession?
Maybe God has already given the grace. It's just there in confession waiting for you.
A lot of times you cry out to God for some type of enlightenment. "Lord, show me what I need to do. Lord, direct me!" And He never seems to answer. When was the last time you asked someone for advice? Maybe God has already given the answer to them. You just have to be humble enough to ask this person. It's ordinary.
Even the Eucharist, if you think about it, the Eucharist, the greatest miracle that Christ has given to us; His real Presence, His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, is given to us in the most ordinary way possible. Food. Something we do three times a day. What's more ordinary than that? . . .
God prefers the ordinary way.
But it takes a degree of humility to submit to that. Because it might not be what we prefer.
Humble, ordinary obedience to laws. To rules. To institutions. That will be the means by which God will answer your prayers.
If there is a grace for which you are praying that is very great, it may take more than the "ordinary things" to obtain. But you don't have to worry about figuring that out.
If God realizes that to give you this grace, a greater sacrifice must be offered, He will give you the sacrifice. He will do that, you don't have to go and find it. There's really no need to take on extra penances. Just do the ordinary penances you're supposed to be doing.
And if you're crying out to God for the conversion of some loved one who is far from Him, that's a huge grace. So it may require a large cross. Know that, if God sees it is necessary, He will give you those crosses that you need. You don't have to go looking for them. They will come to you.
Your job is to humbly submit to them. Not to resist. . . .
Christ chose to be weak for us. He chose that. And He wants us to be willing to submit to weakness as well. Because in that submission. in that obedience to His will, we find true humility.
Our Lord cannot refuse the request of one who asks with humility.
Just be humble. Submit in obedience to the ordinary requirements of society. Of the Church. Of your family. Offer your prayers to God asking for that which you want and need. Expect that through these ordinary means, He will answer your prayer.
Yes, it's nice when we get that flashy miracle. But I'm telling you: miracles happen to you all the time.
2 Kgs 5:14-17; Ps 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9; 2 Tm 2:8-13; Lk 17:11-19
Homily begins at 21:11
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