Thursday August 18, 2022

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DISCOVER TODAY: God can help you overcome the sins that are currently controlling you.

Good News Reflection for:

Thursday of the 20th Week of Ordinary Time
August 18, 2022

Today’s Prayer:

Good Father, grant me the grace to be obedient to your will and to approach each mission filled with love and courage. Amen.

Subscribe to Today’s Saint Quote & Prayer:
gnm.org/SaintQuotes/

Today’s Readings:

Ezekiel 36:23-28
Ps 51:12-15,18-19
Matthew 22:1-14
bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/081822.cfm
USCCB Podcast of the Readings:
bible.usccb.org/podcasts/audio/2022-08-18

Living in the land of holiness

What this world needs now, to deliver it from so much evil happening in so many different ways, is a stronger, holier Christian body of believers. In today’s first reading, God speaks to us with assurances that, because of our desire to love him and follow him, we will grow in holiness. No doubt about it!

Are you holy now? Yes! When you were baptized, your sinful nature died and you received life in the HOLY Spirit. The problem is, we don’t always act according to our true nature. We reject our own goodness and thus we sin — or said more accurately, we reject the Holy Spirit within us.

If we accept the invitation of Jesus to join the great wedding banquet, like he explains in the Gospel reading on the Thursday of the 20th Week of Ordinary Time, our heavenly King graces us with a feast of his goodness. And our Queen Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary, who lived her entire life in the fullness of grace, adds her prayers to ours and shares with us her gift of grace.

This is how God proves his holiness to the world. He proves it, as Ezekiel prophesied, through us and our ever-increasing holiness. What sins are currently controlling you? God can help you overcome them! Read Ezekiel’s words as a promise from God to you personally:

“I will take you away from that world of sinfulness, because it’s foreign to your true nature, and I will bring you back into my kingdom, your real home.

“I will sprinkle purity (clean water) upon you to cleanse you from all your impurities. I will cleanse you from the muck of your idols, from everything that you hold dearer than your true God.

“I will remove your stony heart and give you a new heart — the Sacred Heart of my Son — and place within you a new spirit — my Holy Spirit. This Spirit will empower you to live by my statutes and decrees.

“You shall live in the land of holiness — my kingdom — which I gave to your ancestors, the saints who went before you.

“You shall be my child, and I will be your God. Indeed, this is already so, because you desire it! All I ever needed from you was your permission to lead you, to change you, and to embrace you. Thank you for giving this to Me in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, in the penance rites of Mass, and in your everyday love for Me.”

To reflect further on this, go to our WordByte called: “How the Witness of Hope Can Change the World” @ https://wordbytes.org/spiritual-growth/hope-can-change-world.

Thank you for reflecting with us on this Thursday of the 20th Week of Ordinary Time!

© 2022 by Terry A. Modica

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