(Ex 19:2-6a, Rom 5:6-11, Mt 9:36–10:8): Let Us Boast in the Mercy of God, Who Guides Us with Tender Care
Everyone, I believe, has a dream. Though it may not have been there from the very first moment we came into this world, that dream has grown deeper, more concrete, and more beautifully three-dimensional as we gradually came to know this world, breathe with it, and understand it more profoundly. Through that dream, you surely wished to make the world shine more beautifully, fill the cold crevices of this life with warm affection, and restore broken, painful relationships once again with love.
However, as life goes on, has not the heavy responsibility for others—stacked layer upon layer like the weight of time—along with the countless wounds sustained just to survive in this world, broken the very wings you hoped would soar with that dream? Has the dream you once wished to paint been left behind merely as a forgotten memory on a sketchbook, remaining only as a distant mirage?
In the Book of Exodus (19:4-5), the Lord reminds us of our journey, revealing that He never forgets and always cares for every single detail of our lives: “You have seen for yourselves how I bore you up on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Therefore, if you hearken to my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my special possession, dearer to me than all other people, though all the earth is mine. You shall be to me a kingdom of priests, a holy nation.” Thus, He grants us strength and tells us that He will use us according to His holy will.
Even when we are struggling at the very bottom of a shattered self-esteem, the Lord does not judge or evaluate our condition. Instead, out of His infinite love for us, He emptied and sacrificed Himself. As Romans 5:8 tells us, “But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.” This very act is our "proof of qualification" before God. This reveals that we are children who will be lifted up again—not because we are perfect or high and mighty, but solely by the power of His loving will and deep compassion, no matter what we look like or what circumstances we find ourselves in. He is reminding us never to forget that we came into this world as beings truly worthy of God's love.
Our falls may be the result of our own choices, or the friction caused by our imperfect interactions with one another. It may even be that the structural contradictions of this world, repeated through the disharmony of incomplete human beings, are what robbed us of our dreams. Yet, no matter what causes and effects have shaped our present reality, God’s love for us can never change, and our existential value before Him remains firm and unshaken.
For He is our Lord and our God, who, seeing us “troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd,” is “moved with pity” (Mt 9:36) and desires to pour out His unsparing love and mercy upon us.
This unchangeable, miracle-like truth—that our very existence is loved by God—deeply and firmly solidifies the beginning, the present, and the future identity of our lives. His unchanging, warm embrace holds us close and empowers us to rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and give thanks in all circumstances (cf. 1 Thes 5:16-18).
Like writing an autobiography, I invite you to reflect deeply within your soul upon the journey of your life, from the earliest memories you can reach up to this very moment. In doing so, you will surely discover God’s providence and the invisible yet palpable hand of His love, which has held onto you through countless cycles of falling and rising again.
Let us cherish those times and experiences, and bring them forth. Let us do this so that, as today’s Gospel proclaims in verses 7 and 8, we may unhesitatingly be used as His instruments to declare that “The kingdom of heaven is at hand,” driven by the graces we have received without cost and must give without cost.
In the end, there is only one thing we must do. As Romans 5:11 guides us: “We also boast of God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”
Remembering with love the warmth of the Lord's delicate and passionate hand that has held me at every moment, I pray that the entire journey of our living breath may become a diary that reveals Him. Will you write that diary upon this world together with me? Amen.