Welcome to our day of the reflection for this Wednesday, April 29th, and today the theme
of all the scriptures is about mission and during this Easter-Tide season we are remembering
as we go back to the early church and ask the apostles how that mission of the new covenant
began to spread and grow momentum. You have to think about the old covenant. The covenant
was about eight people. There was a stability and it was a bit insular. It was just Israel
was focused on being Israel, being the people of God. But now in the new covenant, these Jews
like Peter and James and John are now mission focused. Now they are thinking outwardly
as the gospel goes out and that's what the church wants us to remember but also for a purpose.
So we'll come to that in a minute. But I love how Acts chapter 12 talks about the word of God
as a dynamic reality. The word of God continued to spread and grow. I love that idea of the agency
of God's word. Now of course the word of God isn't just the Bible or though the Bible reflects
the word of God but the word of God is Christ and then we have this idea that the word that
gospel message is going out has a certain agency, a certain power. I like that. I like that idea
that if we feel emboldened by we want to reflect and tell the message of God's word and of God's
good news and that it has its own power and dynamism. We don't have to go and necessarily go
find out the marketing spin to make the gospel effective. It has its own efficacy, it has its own
power and we need to be reminded of that so we have confidence in that word and then the
first reading begins with that word of God having agency and spreading and then it ends with
they're spreading the word of God in all the Jewish synagogues throughout the Greco-Roman world
and so again they're proclaiming the word of God now it's fulfilled in Jesus Christ and then
we have Psalm 67 which again is about how all the nations will exalt and give glory to God right
and what the church is reminding and what the early church saw at that point was that even in
the the Psalms of Israel there was the sense that God's word and the faith in God was to go out to
all the nations and so what the new covenant is doing is not working against the old covenant
it's fulfilling it it's bringing it to its purpose that even in the scriptures of Israel it was
clear that all the nations were to proclaim God's salvation and so if all the nations were to
proclaim God's salvation which we hear in Psalm 67 then clearly that means all the nations had
to come to faith in God and that's exactly what we see fulfilled in Acts the apostles and the
gospel and then Jesus Christ out whoever believes in me right whoever believes in me and it
believes not just in me but the one who set me that is the Father and they will have life right
and I came to be light to the world not just light to a nation Israel but to the world
and so again the church is replaying the story in the words of Jesus and realizing that Jesus
had given the apostles a global mission a worldwide mission that Jesus' mission was also global
and worldwide that he was to be a light to the world not just to a nation and so as we reflect on
that the church is reminding us today that we are to be missionaries that we are to be witnesses
to the entirety of the world and so that that is so important we can't be insular we can't just
be ministering to those who are Catholic we have to be ministering to all the world and so today
let's reflect in our own life am I a witness to the world to outsiders of the church that's what
we're called to do today so let's reflect on that message may the Lord bless and keep you
hello i'm dr. Tim Gray at the Augustan Institute and i want to tell you about a retreat coming up
at the end of may may 22nd to the 24th on the spirituality of saint paul i've been teaching
on the life of paul for many many decades now and i'm really excited about taking the key
spiritual lessons of paul for our own spiritual life and so this retreat is called in
christ one of paul's favorite phrases and i'm going to talk about how the appausal paul
gives us many opportunities practical spiritual lessons and reflections on how to live our life
in christ and so please come out and join us and i want to give you know a first crack i think
this retreat will fill up i want all of you who will listen to the day of the reflections to have
the first chance to come for this retreat we'll have mass we'll have adoration we'll have meals
together and you can find out more and you can register at a gustan institute dot org slash
retreats a gustan institute dot org slash retreats i hope to see you here god bless
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