Category: Bible Reading & Meditation

“Their amazement went beyond all bounds: ‘He has done everything well. He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak!’ ” —Mark 7:37 Jesus healed people physically as a sign of healing people spiritually. He opened the ears of the deaf and freed the tongues of the mute as a sign that He would open our ears so that we can have a greater faith and open our mouths to proclaim that faith (see Mk 7:35). Our spiritual deafness, dumbness, blindness, and paralysis are potentially damning. We live in potentially devastating spiritual conditions. However, Jesus is our Hope, our only...

“The Lord said to Solomon: ‘Since this is what you want…’ ” —1 Kings 11:11 Solomon made a great start in following the Lord. In his youth, God presented Solomon with the chance to have anything he wanted (1 Kgs 3:5ff). Solomon chose wisdom, so as to rule God’s people with understanding and justice. God was pleased with Solomon’s choice (1 Kgs 3:10). Later in life, however, Solomon used his God-given power to indulge his own wanton desires rather than fulfilling God’s desires. He fell so far into lust and idolatry that his heart turned away from the Lord. Solomon...

“The queen of Sheba, having heard of Solomon’s fame, came…She arrived in Jerusalem.” —1 Kings 10:1, 2 Jesus testified that the queen of Sheba, that is, “the queen of the South,” “came from the farthest corner of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon” (Mt 12:42). She had a strong desire to listen to the wisdom of Israel as spoken through Solomon (2 Chr 9:1-2). She willingly suffered the rigors, hardships, and expenses of long-distance travel in the arid, ancient world to find this wisdom (1 Kgs 10:1ff). Jesus approved of her quest, and inferred that she “will...

“Their heart is far from Me.” —Mark 7:6 Have you ever been in love with someone who couldn’t care less about you? You try to be nice to them, and if they do notice you, it’s only for the purpose of getting something from you. Jesus unconditionally loves all of humanity, and this is how He is too often treated in return. So many turn to Jesus to meet a need, but their hearts are far from Him (Mk 7:6). The Lord truly desires to provide our needs (see Phil 4:19; Mt 6:30; 7:9-11). Yet, He desires to provide for...

“Wherever He put in an appearance, in villages, in towns, or at crossroads, they laid the sick in the market places and begged Him to let them touch just the tassel of His cloak. All who touched Him got well.” —Mark 6:56 To touch the tassel of Jesus’ cloak was to touch a sacramental, a sign of God’s grace “to keep all the commandments of the Lord, without going wantonly astray after the desires of [one’s] hearts and eyes” (Nm 15:39). As baptized Catholic Christians, we can not only touch a sacramental but can receive the sacrament of the Eucharist,...