Lv. 13:1-2,44-46; Ps. 32:1-2, 5, 11; 1 Cor. 10:31—11:1; Mk. 1:40-45
Be made clean through the power of God’s love and mercy. From the time of Moses to the coming of Jesus, leprosy was seen as a punishment from God, a progressive decay of the body, an “unclean” person in body and soul destined to live apart from the people of God. We are all familiar with the expression “cleanliness is next to Godliness”. For some this means keeping up an image on the outside of self-respect by the way we dress, keep the house clean, take care of our property. Jesus however comes to bring about our cleansing inside out. He comes to wash us clean of sin.
Today we are to identify the leprosy of sin in our lives. It is the visible sign of an impure heart. It comes through the eyes of envy, jealousy, lust, anger, impatience. It spills out of the mouth with criticism, sarcasm, threats, ridicule, and gossip. It turns to vengeance in the hands through abuse, violence, punishment, and control. The leprosy of sin is the seed planted in the mind, nurtured in the heart until it gains power of over the will and the act is committed. It likens to a cancer that is dormant until triggered by our weakness and quickly becomes malignant causing death, death to our relationship with God, with others, and even with our true image as a child of God. Who do we blame?
We can’t say “the devil made me do it” because the devil has no power over us unless we invite him into our lives. All the devil does is plant the seed of thought where he can find weakness in our soul. We can’t blame others for our actions since it is how we choose to respond to them and not their demand on us. Personal responsibility is how God responded to Adam and Eve and to the serpent, each according to their act of the will. Personal responsibility is how God responds to us by the choice we make. The God of love and mercy is also the God of justice. The work of justice from God is not a punishment but a cleansing of the soul. The work of justice is to transform the impure and make it pure. Forgiveness and reconciliation are the beginning of the work of justice something to contemplate.
Too often and too many view the Lord’s forgiveness as a “get out of jail pass” and a freedom of consequence. That is not the work of justice. It does not even reflect the love of God in his mercy. It is the start of his merciful love to begin to transform us, the change agent to cleanse us of our sins is the work yet to be done. God’s love is not to leave us to be as we are a sinful people but as call to follow in his footsteps, to live in imitation of Christ, to allow the word of God to become incarnated into body and become a true temple of the Holy Spirit. God is a change agent for nothing remains the same in his creation. It is all a movement in the direction of the eternal waiting to be revealed. Are we ready for the eternal? God is ready for us.
Today God says to us “I do will it. Be made clean.” God’s wills for all to come to salvation but he cannot save us without us, that is he cannot save us against our will. We must come in faith to receive him. When we receive him, we come in humility not pride, we come as a sinner in need of redemption, we come willing to trust him and put our faith in the work he has prepared for our calling. In other word we come to do the will of the Father. The will of the Father is the work of salvation that all may be made clean. It is in serving that we grow in holiness and shed the scales of our sinfulness.
When Jesus healed the leper, he told him to tell no one but the healed man could not contain the mercy of God within himself. When we experience the mercy of God, we cannot contain the love that has entered our soul. It is a light that cannot be kept hidden. When we become the Lord’s servant doing the will of the Father then we become a light to the world and others will seek that light. This is how we know we are living in his light when God sends us his poor, his hungry, his sick just like people kept coming to Jesus. Who is God sending to us this day? Let us be ready to receive him and to offer up to God an act of faith, hope, and charity. Greater is the change from within coming from God from a single act of mercy than all the material world can create. Greater the treasure in heaven than the riches of this world. Be that person!
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