Faith Daily | 14 February 2022

PRAYER of the DAY - APBA p 537

Let your merciful ears, O Lord,

be open to the prayers of your humble servants;

and that they may obtain their petitions

make them to ask such things as shall please you;

through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

GOSPEL for the Day: Mark 8: 11-13

11The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, asking him for a sign from heaven, to test him. 12And he sighed deeply in his spirit and said, “Why does this generation ask for a sign? Truly I tell you, no sign will be given to this generation.” 13And he left them, and getting into the boat again, he went across to the other side.

GOSPEL REFLECTION: Peter Galbraith

It is interesting to compare the words of Jesus in this passage with his response in Matthew 11 v 4-6. There, John the Baptist had sent word from prison through his followers asking whether the reports he had heard meant that Jesus was indeed the one.

“Go and tell John what you hear and see: The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them”.

Clearly this was more than enough for John.

And these were the same actions that the Pharisees witnessed as members of the populace within which Jesus was fulfilling his mission. Their choice of words betrayed their own insincerity. The Pharisees had this same visual evidence, but their approach reads like an orchestrated attempt to wrest back control within a situation that was rapidly getting out of hand. They attempted to require Jesus to act on their terms and would of course be the ones to decide whether any requested “sign” met the needs they were attempting to impose! Jesus saw right through them, and also despaired that the population at large seemed unable to comprehend the significance of what they had been witnessing.

The challenge to the Church is ongoing. How to recognise and use the example of Jesus’s words and actions while on earth as sufficient to engage with problems faced by successive generations.

Amen

FINAL PRAYER: for Saint Valentine’s Day

I said a Valentine prayer for You and asked the Lord above to fill your heart and bless your soul with the precious gift of love.

I asked Him for sincere love the kind that’s meant to stay just like the generous love You give to those You touch each day.

I prayed for love from family and from every cherished friend then I asked the Lord to give you His love that knows no end.

Amen