Roman Catholic The Word Among Us Daily Mass Reading & Daily Meditation for Saturday, 31 January 2015

Roman Catholic The Word Among Us Daily Mass Reading & Daily Meditation for Saturday, 31 January 2015
Meditation - Hebrews 11: Description of faith
1 Faith is the reality of what we hope for, the proof of what we don’t see. 2 The elders in the past were approved because they showed faith.
8 By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was going to receive as an inheritance. He went out without knowing where he was going.
9 By faith he lived in the land he had been promised as a stranger. He lived in tents along with Isaac and Jacob, who were coheirs of the same promise. 10 He was looking forward to a city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.
11 By faith even Sarah received the ability to have a child, though she herself was barren and past the age for having children, because she believed that the one who promised was faithful. 12 So descendants were born from one man (and he was as good as dead). They were as many as the number of the stars in the sky and as countless as the grains of sand on the seashore. 13 All of these people died in faith without receiving the promises, but they saw the promises from a distance and welcomed them. They confessed that they were strangers and immigrants on earth. 14 People who say this kind of thing make it clear that they are looking for a homeland. 15 If they had been thinking about the country that they had left, they would have had the opportunity to return to it. 16 But at this point in time, they are longing for a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore, God isn’t ashamed to be called their God—he has prepared a city for them.
17 By faith Abraham offered Isaac when he was tested. The one who received the promises was offering his only son. 18 He had been told concerning him, Your legitimate descendants will come from Isaac.[a] 19 He figured that God could even raise him from the dead. So in a way he did receive him back from the dead.[Footnotes:
Hebrews 11:18 Gen 21:12]
Saint John Bosco, Priest
The one who had made the promise was trustworthy. (Hebrews 11:11)
What gets you out of bed every morning? When motivational speakers and vocational counselors ask this question, they’re not looking for answers like “The baby was crying” or “My alarm rang.” They want to help you identify your “passion”—something you love (or would love) to be doing with your life, the purpose that fires you with energy.
Certainly, Abraham wasn’t searching for his passion on the day he rolled out of his blankets and started traveling to a distant promised land. He had found his passion! Or rather, it had found him. Out of the blue, a God he didn’t know promised that he would have “descendants as numerous as the stars” and would become a blessing for “all the families of the earth” (Hebrews 11:12; Genesis 12:3). Yeah, right! he could have said. Now that I’m seventy-five and Sarah is sixty-five, we’re going to go wandering into the unknown and have a baby? I don’t think so! But, remarkably, Abraham believed. And day after day—despite failures and setbacks, despite the twenty-five-year wait for Isaac’s birth, despite the fact that he never saw the promises completely fulfilled—Abraham kept believing.
How did he stay so focused and energized? By staking his life on the fact that he had a call from God and that “the one who had made the promise was trustworthy” (Hebrews 11:11). That’s how our faith and passion for God grow, too. It’s not enough to agree mentally with the Creed when we recite it on Sundays. Important as that is, faith can grow only in response to a personal call from a God we come to know in a personal way. Without this personal encounter, we won’t find the motivation to put our faith to work.
So ask yourself: Have I heard Jesus calling me? Do I know what he wants me to do and to be? If not, am I seeking him out? If yes, how am I responding?
And tomorrow when you wake up, before your feet hit the floor, thank the Father for his wonderful purpose in creating you. Tell Jesus that you want to follow him more closely. Ask the Holy Spirit for a holy “passion” for the rest of the journey.
“Here I am, Lord. Where will you lead me today?” Amen!
Luke 1:69 He has raised up a mighty savior for us in his servant David’s house,
70     just as he said through the mouths of his holy prophets long ago.
71 He has brought salvation from our enemies
    and from the power of all those who hate us.
72 He has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors,
    and remembered his holy covenant,
73         the solemn pledge he made to our ancestor Abraham.
He has granted 74 that we would be rescued
        from the power of our enemies
    so that we could serve him without fear,
75         in holiness and righteousness in God’s eyes,
            for as long as we live.

Mark 4: Jesus stops a storm
35 Later that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s cross over to the other side of the lake.” 36 They left the crowd and took him in the boat just as he was. Other boats followed along.
37 Gale-force winds arose, and waves crashed against the boat so that the boat was swamped. 38 But Jesus was in the rear of the boat, sleeping on a pillow. They woke him up and said, “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re drowning?”
39 He got up and gave orders to the wind, and he said to the lake, “Silence! Be still!” The wind settled down and there was a great calm. 40 Jesus asked them, “Why are you frightened? Don’t you have faith yet?”
41 Overcome with awe, they said to each other, “Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!”
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