“SPRINGS OF LIVING WATER”
Daily Spiritual Reflections
4th December 2021
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SATURDAY, FIRST WEEK OF ADVENT
Is 30:19-21,23-26; Ps 147:1-6; Mt 9:35 - 10:1,5-8
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HE SENDS US SHEPHERDS TO HEAL AND CLEANSE
In the first reading, Prophet Isaiah exhorts us to vigilance and right living, that we might ready ourselves to rejoice in the mystery of the Incarnation and look hopefully toward the full revelation of the mystery of salvation. The reading describes the kingdom of God’s reign at the end of time. The Lord provides in abundance for his people – rain, rich wheat, spacious meadows for fodder, flowing streams, etc. The physical world becomes a part of the goodness of God. God is present, teaching us. This is the redemption to look for; a world without worry, where all our wounds will be healed. It reminds us how God is always ready to receive us back, how he is always seeking us.
The responsorial psalm gives us the picture of the night sky in all its vastness. The God who created the heavens and the earth in all its immensity, still heals the wounded, the broken hearted and the suffering out of his great love.
The gospel uses a very traditional image in the Bible for God’s people: “They were… like sheep without a shepherd.” In Palestine, it was very rare to see sheep without a shepherd. The pasture was not plentiful there. Sheep needed a guide. It is a valid picture of our relationship with Christ. We can stray away when we look to other guides.
Without Christ and his teaching, we can grow feeble and even die by falling prey to the way of the world – “live for now, for pleasure, for self”. Jesus does not expect us to be independent and self-sufficient, but rather childlike (Mt 18:3). He is a caring saviour with a compassionate heart, moved to pity by our suffering, poverty and ignorance. He sends us shepherds to lead us to him; these ministers can heal us, giving us what they have received from his divine hand, not only a foretaste of the complete healing that will be ours in God’s kingdom but hope as well for the full realization of that kingdom.
Response: Blessed are all those who wait for the Lord.
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