Friday - March 05, 2021
TODAY'S READINGS
March 5, 2021
Friday
of the Second Week of Lent
Lectionary: 234
Israel loved Joseph best of all his sons,
for he was the child of his old age;
and he had made him a long tunic.
When his brothers saw that their father loved him best of all his sons,
they hated him so much that they would not even greet him.
One day, when his brothers had gone
to pasture their father’s flocks at Shechem,
Israel said to Joseph,
“Your brothers, you know, are tending our flocks at Shechem.
Get ready; I will send you to them.”
So Joseph went after his brothers and caught up with them in Dothan.
They noticed him from a distance,
and before he came up to them, they plotted to kill him.
They said to one another: “Here comes that master dreamer!
Come on, let us kill him and throw him into one of the cisterns here;
we could say that a wild beast devoured him.
We shall then see what comes of his dreams.”
When Reuben heard this,
he tried to save him from their hands, saying,
“We must not take his life.
Instead of shedding blood,” he continued,
“just throw him into that cistern there in the desert;
but do not kill him outright.”
His purpose was to rescue him from their hands
and return him to his father.
So when Joseph came up to them,
they stripped him of the long tunic he had on;
then they took him and threw him into the cistern,
which was empty and dry.
They then sat down to their meal.
Looking up, they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead,
their camels laden with gum, balm and resin
to be taken down to Egypt.
Judah said to his brothers:
“What is to be gained by killing our brother and concealing his blood?
Rather, let us sell him to these Ishmaelites,
instead of doing away with him ourselves.
After all, he is our brother, our own flesh.”
His brothers agreed.
They sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver.
Responsorial Psalm
R.
(5a) Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
When the LORD called down a famine on the land
and ruined the crop that sustained them,
He sent a man before them,
Joseph, sold as a slave.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
They had weighed him down with fetters,
and he was bound with chains,
Till his prediction came to pass
and the word of the LORD proved him true.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
The king sent and released him,
the ruler of the peoples set him free.
He made him lord of his house
and ruler of all his possessions.
R. Remember the marvels the Lord has done.
Verse before the Gospel
R. Glory and praise to you O Christ.
God so loved the
world that he gave his only-begotten Son;
so that everyone
who believes in him might have eternal life.
R. Glory and praise to you O Christ..
Gospel
Jesus said to the chief priests and the elders of the people:
“Hear another parable.
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard,
put a hedge around it,
dug a wine press in it, and built a tower.
Then he leased it to tenants and went on a journey.
When vintage time drew near,
he sent his servants to the tenants to obtain his produce.
But the tenants seized the servants and one they beat,
another they killed, and a third they stoned.
Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones,
but they treated them in the same way.
Finally, he sent his son to them,
thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’
But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another,
‘This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.’
They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
What will the owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes?”
They answered him,
"He will put those wretched men to a wretched death
and lease his vineyard to other tenants
who will give him the produce at the proper times.”
Jesus said to them, "Did you never read in the Scriptures:
The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
by the Lord has this been done,
and it is wonderful in our eyes?
Therefore, I say to you,
the Kingdom of God will be taken away from you
and given to a people that will produce its fruit.”
When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables,
they knew that he was speaking about them.
And although they were attempting to arrest him,
they feared the crowds, for they regarded him as a prophet.
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Progressing from Tragedy into Triumph
How awful we feel when our plans get sidetracked, especially the important ones. How tragic when we lose a loved one or a job or our health or a marriage. Discouragement sets in, as well as despair with hopelessness, anger and mourning.
That's how Joseph probably felt in today's first reading, because he lost his doting father, his family, his inheritance, his home, everything that was familiar to him, and all his plans, hopes and dreams for the future. He nearly even lost his life. Sold into slavery, he lost his freedom. He had every reason to despair and grieve.
Jesus gives us another example of ruined plans in the parable of today's Gospel passage. The property owner's hopes for a good crop were sabotaged by the tenants who were supposed to take care of his vineyard. And they murdered his son!
It's normal to feel resentful and to hold onto huge grudges when our lives get sidetracked by the sins of others, as in these two stories. Our lives would be so much better if only the "jerks" we know would stop causing so much trouble.
We try to cooperate with God's will, do what he's called us to do, and live out what he's designed for us, but then someone's sinfulness gets in the way. Grrrr!
The good news is that nothing is ever really destroyed -- no dream, no plans, no relationships permanently side-tracked -- if we're following Jesus and living in his plans for our lives. God is bigger and more powerful than any disaster and sinful interference, more loving than any loss. Out of deep concern for us, he starts planning how to make triumph come from our tragedies long before the disasters begin.
It was many years before Joseph became the Pharaoh's right-hand man and saved all of Egypt and his own family from starvation in the drought. It only took the vineyard owner's son (Jesus) a short while to rise from the dead and become the cornerstone of a victorious Church. How long did it take before he became the cornerstone of your life? What happened to you before you gave him your heart? What disastrous directions did you go in before you converted? How did the mess you got into convince you that you needed God?
Your own life is already an example of how God turns tragedies into triumphs. Whenever we ask for his help, he takes the bad consequences of sin and reshapes them into a glorious plan that will benefit many. Isn't it amazing? He is so awesome! It might take longer than we'd like it to take, but his plans for victory are always very amazing!
Make Jesus the cornerstone of whatever is going wrong in your life. Let him take it over with his own ideas and dreams for you, which are far better than anything you could dream up. And give him time to work.
Today's Prayer
Your love for us is so great, Lord, that You entrust us with the inheritance of Your Kingdom. Forgive us for not appreciating this wonderful gift. Amen.
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The mother of Jesus promised St. Dominic that, “one day through the rosary & the scapular I shall save the world!”
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