OPEN ME UP, LORD, TO WHOLENESS!
[BREAKING THE BREAD OF GOD’S WORD]
23rd Sunday OT-B
September 6, 2015
OPEN ME UP, LORD, TO WHOLENESS!
Many, many years ago, as a young first-time traveler, I was
introduced to the fad of “whole wheat bread.” For the life of me, I didn’t know
the difference between what we youngsters back home called “bread” and “whole
wheat” bread. But since I was healthier than a mule then, neither did I care if
there was, indeed, a difference.
Now, I think I know better. At the very least, I know that
being broken is not exactly being whole, and that being whole is being healthy,
and being healthy means every part of you is working in tiptop condition.
I am sure you all have experiences of being in fear or
overcome with anxiety. Being fearful could make one do either of two things:
run furiously away or being paralyzed to inaction. One does not feel whole. One
does not feel “sane” – and I use the word in the Latin sense, meaning in a
state of well-being.
I am sure, too, that you have experienced being a little
biased against certain individuals or groups of people. I grew up hating
“Vietcongs” even if I didn’t know who they were. I heard about them on radio,
growing up as a child. I thought they were monsters ready to pounce on innocent
people. They sounded to me like they were cruel people out to rob everyone of
their freedom.
I wasn’t sane. I wasn’t whole. Some part of me nurtured
hatred against the unknown – a group of people who were demonized by mainstream
media then.
I am a man of little patience. I am almost sure that when I
get even older than I am now, if God lends me a little more time, I will most
likely suffer from difficulty of hearing. And yet, I must confess, I have
little patience for people who make me repeat what I say two or three times.
Even if I am not, by any means, deaf yet, I am not sane. I
am not whole. No one who is unable to tolerate others in their disability
cannot be totally whole, or at least, trying to be holy, though long-suffering
patience and tolerance.
I look up to the Lord today begging for his mercy and
compassion. He shows Himself today precisely as one who can heal me … as one
who can make me whole … as the only one who merits to be called the healer par
excellence.
I would like to share to my readers that I lay claim today
to his Divine utterance: “Ephphatha!” “Be opened!”
Open me up, Lord, to total healing. Break me open to
tolerance and patience. For while I still am impatient to those who cannot
fully hear me, I, too am in more need of healing than they are.
I am deaf. I am mute. I pretend so often not to hear the
cries of the suffering and the lonely and the weary. I do not use my talents
and powers to do my part and proclaim the saving truths about you, O Saving and
healing Lord!
Open my ears, Lord, that I may hear. Open my eyes, Lord,
that I may see. Open my mouth Lord, that I may proclaim what needs to be
proclaimed: “Praise the Lord, my soul!”
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