Daily Scripture Reflection & Prayer: May 14, 2024

Date:  Tuesday of the 7th Week of Easter/Feast of St. Matthias

Scripture Text:  John 15:9-17

Jesus said to his disciples: “As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. “I have told you this so that my joy might be in you and your joy might be complete. This is my commandment: love one another as I love you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father. It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you. This I command you:  love one another.”

Breaking the text open – background and summary:

The gospel reading for today is taken from Jesus’ “Vine and Branches” discourse and speaks to us of His union with His disciples then and now. Love is the basis of the union: Jesus’ love for the Father, Jesus’ love for us, our love for the Father, our love for Jesus, our love for one another. This love is self-giving, and Jesus perfectly demonstrates it for us in his passion and death, giving His life to save ours. As we follow Jesus, we are urged to remember that we are chose by Christ and appointed to bear fruit. The fruit we bear will be dependent upon how well we remain in and with Jesus.

Meditating on the text with personal questions:

Do I remain with Christ or do I visit Christ? Is my modus operandi love for my LORD lived moment to moment and witnessed by others as love for them?

Praying:

LORD, apart from You, I have no life. You chose me to be, to live, to follow, to remain with You. Flood my mind and heart with your transformative and life-giving love; make me a channel of that love, your instrument, wherever I go, whatever I do, now, then and always. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.