19 May
May 19th, 2010
"God is our shelter, our strength Ever ready to help in time of trouble"
Ps. 46
In the first Book of Kings 19 : 1 – 14 we read that Elijah the prophet spent a night in a cave near Horeb. Yahweh appeared to him and asked him what he wanted. Elijah said, “The sons of Israel have deserted you and killed all the prophets. I am the only one left and they want to kill me also.” He was told to go and stand on the mountain and wait for Yahweh. A mighty wind came. Yahweh wasn”t in the wind. After the wind came an earthquake. Yahweh wasn”’t there either. Then came a fire. No Yahweh there. Finally there came a gentle breeze. At this Elijah covered his face with his clock and went and stood at the entrance to the cave. Yahweh spoke to him and said, “What are you doing here Elijah?”
Yahweh comes to each of us in many different ways. Usually he comes in the ordinary events of our everyday lives, times of joy or sorrow, times of worry and anxiety. Very often, we are not aware of God’’s presence. We are so busy we forget about God. Like Elijah, we might find Him in a gentle breeze, in a kindness shown to us, in a friendly smile.
Sometimes what seems to us to be a disaster could be a turning point in our lives revealing God”’’s wonderful love for us. God loves us always. He is always there for us whether we realise it or not. St. Paul says “I live now not my own life, but the life of Christ who dwells within me.” Galatians 2 : 20 The poet, Francis Thompson tells us in the “Hound of Heaven” that we spend our lives running away from the God who loves us and is forever pursuing us.
Prayer
Prayer : Lord, I thank you for your everlasting goodness and your love that knows no ending. When I am under pressure you are always there for me. Help me to see your hand in the challenges, successes and failures of daily life. Renew my confidence and trust in you. This I ask through Christ our Lord. Amen.
The prayer for each day has been prepared by various members of the Holy Family Association. All who visit our website are remembered in prayer. If you would like us to pray for a particular need, simply complete and submit the form on the right hand side of this page. You may wish to leave a comment in the space below.
Just a Thought
How the Holy Family prayer: A Reflection by Pope Benedict XVI
“I would like to invite you to reflect on the place of prayer in the life of the Holy Family of Nazareth. The home of Nazareth, in fact, is a school of prayer where we learn to listen, to ponder and to penetrate the profound meaning of the manifestation of the Son of God, drawing our example from Mary, Joseph and Jesus.
Pope Paul VI during his visit to Nazareth said “we come to understand the need for a spiritual discipline, if we wish to follow the teaching of the Gospel and become disciples of Christ.” And he added: “First, it teaches us silence. Oh! That there would be reborn in us the esteem for silence, that wonderful and indispensable atmosphere of the spirit: while we are deafened by so many noises, sounds and clamorous voices in the frantic and tumultuous times of modern life. Oh! Silence of Nazareth, teach us to be resolute in good thoughts, intent upon the interior life, ready to listen well to the secret inspirations of God and the exhortations of the true masters.”
We can glean several insights on the Holy Family’s prayer and relationship with God from the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ childhood. We may begin with the Presentation of Jesus in the temple. St. Luke tells us that Mary and Joseph, “when the time came for their purification according to the Law of Moses, brought the child up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord”(2:22). Like every observant Jewish family, Jesus’ parents go up to the temple to consecrate the firstborn son to God and to offer sacrifice. Moved by fidelity to the law’s prescriptions, they set off from Bethlehem and go up to Jerusalem with Jesus, who is now forty days old. Instead of a one-year-old lamb, they present the offering of simple families; that is two young pigeons. The Holy Family’s pilgrimage is one of faith, of the offering of gifts, a symbol of prayer, and of encounter with the Lord, whom Mary and Joseph already see in the son Jesus.”
