7th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A
“Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.” I want us to really sit in this phrase. What feelings does this phrase bring up? I find that I feel quite hardened to the idea. I find it a hard balance between “God loves you as you are, where you are” and “be perfect as your heavenly Father.” Another question I have is, why should we be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect? It seems like a command from Jesus, yet we know it is impossible to fulfill this. We therefore have a choice. We could shut down and think He couldn’t mean that. Seriously, why would we compare ourselves to God? We want to look good, how is this possible if we take this Scripture seriously? It feels like you are the lowest student in the class and the teacher says why can’t you be like the smartest. Or even better, you are a crippled athlete bound to a wheel chair and for you it is an amazing feat to get out of bed and manage the smallest physical things, then someone says to you that you need to be like that world class athlete. How would that not be depressing? I suspect that it would be depressing. However, if the person really knew you and knew what you were actually capable of, that you are not merely a crippled athlete and that you could rise to the greatness and that it was undignified to sit in the wheelchair and not achieve your potential, then they would encourage you. Any good coach would do this.
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