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The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Tuesday in the Twenty-fourth Week of Ordinary Time, Year I, 19 September 2023 1 Timothy 3:1-13 ><))))*> _ ><))))*> _ ><))))*> Luke 7:11-17
Your words today, O God our loving Father, are very encouraging and assuring with our varied aspirations in life:
Beloved: This saying is trustworthy: whoever aspires to the office of bishop desires a noble task.
1 Timothy 3:1
When is an aspiration to any office or post, not just in the Church, is a desire for a noble task?
Help us, dear Jesus to make our aspiration a desire for a noble task by first looking at the needs of others and not for our personal advantages; looking at how to console others, alleviate their sufferings and strengthen their faith and hopes in life like you did to the widow at Nain when you were moved with pity upon seeing the grieving mother who had been widowed with no one to turn to in life; awaken and heighten our sensitivities, our sense of empathy to the silent sufferings of so many people these days who sometimes hide their grief because no one seem to care at all for them.
Secondly, make our aspirations a noble task by sincerely confronting our very selves if we have the qualifications for any office; let us not aspire for positions for selfish, personal motives nor to what would please us; like the criteria set by St. Paul for those seeking to become bishop and deacon, may we realize that you also give the gifts necessary to respond to your call; let us not insist on ourselves, Lord.
Lastly, may we always leave your mark, dear Jesus in our works as the surest sign that ours is an aspiration for a noble task; may God our Father be the only One recognized and seen, felt and experienced in our tasks like when you raised the dead young man in Nain with everyone exclaiming "God has visited his people" (Lk. 7:16).
Many times, O God, many are losing that aspiration to serve you in others lest they be mistaken for many opportunists politicians who shamelessly aspire for posts with purely personal motives; send us, dear God, with many people who would aspire for noble tasks of serving you through our poor and marginalized brothers and sisters totally forgotten in our many social equations. Amen.
