What a strange reading we have for Mass today, from the book of the prophet Ezekiel. The entire book of Ezekiel seems pretty strange, but today’s reading about God making Ezekiel walk among the dry bones, is one of the most unusual readings so far. It makes you wonder if this is a vision that Ezekiel is writing about? Or an actual occurrence?
A lot of people think the bible is boring, but if they were to read today’s first reading for mass, it is anything but boring. Ezekiel walked through dead human bones, then heard the bones rattle, and saw them joined back together again, and watched the sinews, flesh and skin attached themselves back on the bones again. Then, God breathed His spirit into them, and they came back to life and stood up, as vast as an army.
The one thing that does seem to come across very prominently in the first reading though, is Ezekiel’s willingness to do what God asks. He doesn’t seem to hesitate at all, when God asks him to walk among the dead human bones that covered the ground in all directions. Can you even begin to imagine that? How creepy could that be? Walking among human skulls and dry bones? It sounds more like a nightmare, than a vision or a real occurrence. But, we need to accept the scriptures as the inspired word of God, even if we can’t picture God making someone do such a thing.
The prophet Ezekiel did what God asked, even when He asked him to do a very repulsive thing, because Ezekiel loved God more than anyone else in the world. His great love for God outweighed any hesitation he might have had.
Another thing to notice about the scriptures for Mass, is that today is the feast of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary. When Mary was confronted with an unusual request that God made of her, she didn’t hesitate either, even though His request was strange at the time and she did not understand it. Mary loved God above all things, and did what he asked, without regard to what anyone else thought about it, including her own family, fiance, and the community in which she lived.
Both Ezekiel and the Blessed Virgin Mary loved God more than anything else in their lives. They loved Him enough to do the strangest things, just because He asked them to do it. Could we do the same? Do we really trust God enough to do anything that He should ask of us? Do we love Him enough to overcome our own hesitation, without regard to what others may think of us, and do what He says?
In order to obey God, we have to know Him first, and then we have to spend enough time with Him in prayer to have a personal relationship with Him. We do a lot of things out of a sense of obligation, or because it is the right thing to do, but we only go to extremes because of love.
Everything that you have just read in this reflection is about love for God, and it took up most of this article. That’s the way we are supposed to love God too, not with just tokens of our left over affection. Jesus tells us in the gospel today, that God is supposed to be the most important person in our life:
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment.”
Most of the time we are tempted to skim over this commandment and go on to the one we are more familiar with:
“The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
It is very easy in life to get the two great commandments reversed, and put ourselves and other people first in our life, and give God what’s left over. Most good Catholics and Christian people in general, work hard at loving other people though, just as much as we love ourselves. We understand the second commandment pretty well, and work to apply it in our lives.
However, it isn’t easy to love God. You can’t hug Him. You can’t detect Him with your five senses. He is invisible, because He is a Spirit and not made of temporal matter, but He exists none the less. The only way to truly get to know God, and to love Him like the gospel says, “with all of your heart, with all of your soul, and with all of your mind,” is through a regular prayer life. The sacraments of the church help to predispose us to His grace, but that alone is not enough. He wants our time and attention, in regular conversations with Him through prayer. He has our complete undivided attention then. It is also good to spend some time listening for God in the quiet, after we have said our prayers.
Silence, solitude, nature, manual labor, and time spent in prayer are excellent means of becoming more aware of God’s presence in your life. Surely we can carve out at least a half hour a day, (or more), to spend some time to get to know our creator better? When we reach for God, He always reaches back for us.
Your life will begin to change in ways you can not even begin to imagine, if you do this. It’s like scales that fall off the eyes of your heart, and you will begin to see the world around you in a completely different way. His love will surround you, and permeate everything, strengthening you and supporting you, so that life is so much easier to handle, and gentler on your soul and in your heart, than what you may have ever experienced before.
Daily Mass Readings:
Ezekiel 37: 1-14 / Psalm 107 / Matthew 22: 34-40
