Daily Mass Gospel Reflection- Soul Focus

Word on Fire Ministry ^ | 7.15.23 | Bishop Robert Barron

[MurphsLaw]

Matthew 10:24-33

Friends, in today’s Gospel,
Jesus tells his disciples not to fear those who kill the body
but cannot kill the soul.
Through the power of his being,
he has linked us to the creative source of all existence.
And in that “place,” loved in the Spirit by the Father and the Son,
we are safe—even from those who would kill the body.

But this means that our perspective can and must change.
Most of us spend most of our lives defending ourselves against assaults on the “body”—
keen, almost every waking moment, to protect our psyches,

When we do that, we warp ourselves,
turning our lives defensively inward,
living in a very small spiritual space.
But when we live out of the divine center, we breathe the air of real spiritual freedom.
No longer cramped fearfully around the “body,”
we can move into the wide expanse of the divine will,
following God however he prompts us.
And this state of affairs, this great soul,
is simultaneously alluring in its beauty and terrifying in its demand.

[MurphsLaw]

+++Jesus said to his Apostles:
"No disciple is above his teacher,
no slave above his master.
It is enough for the disciple
that he become like his teacher,
for the slave that he become
like his master.
If they have called the master
of the house Beelzebul,
how much more those of his household!
"Therefore do not be afraid of them.
Nothing is concealed that will not be revealed,
nor secret that will not be known.
What I say to you in the
darkness, speak in the light;
what you hear whispered,
proclaim on the housetops.
And do not be afraid of those
who kill the body but cannot kill the soul;
rather, be afraid of the one who can destroy
both soul and body in Gehenna.
Are not two sparrows sold for a small coin?
Yet not one of them falls to the
ground without your Father's knowledge.
Even all the hairs of your head are counted.
So do not be afraid; you are
worth more than many sparrows.
Everyone who acknowledges me before others
I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father.
But whoever denies me before others,
I will deny before my heavenly Father."+++