Daily Mass Gospel Reflection - Being Ready

Word on Fire Ministry ^ | 07.28.22 | Bishop Robert Barron

[MurphsLaw]

SEVENTEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

MATTHEW 13:47–53

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus presents two more parables on the kingdom of heaven.
In the first parable, we hear that “the Kingdom of heaven is like a net thrown into the sea.”
Here the kingdom of heaven is coming for us. This is an eschatological image of the kingdom,
of God’s final rounding up of the world at the end of time. When will it come? We don’t know.
But we must be ready!
And being ready means being in accord with the rule of God.

Then the second parable:
“Every scribe who has been instructed in the Kingdom of heaven
is like the head of a household who brings from his storeroom both the new and the old.”
Jesus knew that his ministry and teaching were, to a large extent,
in continuity with what came before him.
At the same time, he knew that his preaching and person did represent something new and unprecedented.
So those learned in the kingdom of God love traditions, the heritage of faith;
and those learned in the kingdom also know that the Spirit is doing new things.
Therefore, we have to be open to what he might want to show us.

[MurphsLaw]

+++Jesus said to the disciples: “The Kingdom of heaven is like a net thrown into the sea,
which collects fish of every kind.
When it is full they haul it ashore
and sit down to put what is good into buckets.
What is bad they throw away.
Thus it will be at the end of the age.
The angels will go out and separate the wicked from the righteous
and throw them into the fiery furnace,
where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.”

“Do you understand all these things?”
They answered, “Yes.”
And he replied,
“Then every scribe who has been instructed in the Kingdom of heaven
is like the head of a household who brings from his storeroom
both the new and the old.”
When Jesus finished these parables, he went away from there.+++