Homily: March 31, 2022, Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent

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 The Lord said to Moses, “…my wrath may blaze up against them to consume them.”

In this first reading, we see God’s anger and furious reaction to the infidelity of the Israelites. Then Moses pleaded with God. And it seems his words made sense and God changed His mind.

This reading really confused me. I thought about it a lot. Are these really God’s own words – His threat to destroy the Israelites? And is God negotiable? Does He change his mind so easily?

We know that every word in the bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit, so there must be truth in what we are reading. I don’t have the perfect answer to these questions, but I have some realisations.

First, our God is a living God, He is not a block of wood. He has emotions, and He expresses them freely with His people. He is not indifferent to our behaviour, He feels, because He loves.

Second, our God is a loving God. He has compassion, and mercy for His people. He understands them very well. He understands us very well. He feels sadness when we refuse His love. He cries out in anger but He acts out of love. 

Our God feels. Our God relents. Our God loves.

Imagine if your child, whom you love deeply, were to reject your love, forgets all that you have sacrificed for him, then acknowledges someone else as his family, would you not feel hurt, upset and angry?

But would you not yearn in pain also, that he would realise his mistake, come back home and be reunited with you, the one who truly loves him?

Well, that’s probably how God feels when the Israelites replaced Him, the real living God, with a fake molten calf. God provides and protects them, but this calf can do nothing for them. God pains at their foolishness and blindness.

The Jews in Jesus’ time also did not believe that God sent Him, they continued in their foolishness, they continued to reject God.

God calls them back. God calls us back from our foolishness, worshipping this material, temporal world which can never satisfy us nor do anything for us.

Lent is a time to respond to God’s yearning for us. Let us stop our foolish pursuits and distractions, and return to God wholeheartedly, the one who truly loves us and feels for us.


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