463rd Meditation
“In Your goodness, You sent the prophets to bring them back to the right path, but how often did Your people not listen to their words, but persecuted and killed those whom You sent!” (Praise of the Blessed Trinity).
Our Father did everything to lead His people on the path of salvation. But again and again, the history of Israel shows how they strayed. It was difficult for them to be different from the surrounding nations. Read More
462nd Meditation
“There [in the Promised Land] You would have had them led by judges, but they, wanting to be like other peoples, preferred to have kings. So You gave them kings, but they often did what displeased You” (Praise of the Blessed Trinity).
The drama surrounding the people of Israel was not over. After Joshua’s death, the Israelites turned away from the Lord and served the Baals. They followed the gods of the surrounding peoples (Judg 2:11-12). As a rebuke, the Lord delivered them into the hands of the robbers and the enemies around them (v. 14). They were no longer victorious in the wars and fell into great misery. Read More
461st Meditation
“But again and again Your people rebelled against You. And so they were made to wander through the desert for forty years – until You brought them into the Promised Land, by the hands of Your servant Joshua” (Praise of the Blessed Trinity).
The Covenant sealed between God and His people did not guarantee that all the Israelites would henceforth be free from confusion and sin, and that, trusting in God, they would from then on take the straight path and be guided docilely by the Lord towards the Promised Land. Read More
460th Meditation
“You then brought Your people out of Egypt with a strong hand and led them into the wilderness with signs and wonders. On the mountain You revealed to Your servant Moses the commandments that had been obscured in the hearts of the peoples” (Praise of the Blessed Trinity).
The darkness into which human beings had plunged since the fall into sin made it necessary for our Father to isolate His people from the pagan nations in order to teach them the way to true life. Read More
459th Meditation
“You then created for Yourself the people Israel, who bear Your name within them, and whom You called Your first-born. In Egypt You made them grow, making them into a great people, until they cried out to You in their oppression by Pharaoh” (Praise of the Blessed Trinity).
From that just man whom God found in the midst of the confusion of the nations, a whole people arose. This was to be prepared so that, through the kind providence of our Father, the Just One, the Redeemer of humanity and Head of the Church, which is one, might be born of him: “He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church” (Col 1:17-18a). Read More
458th Meditation
“You saved Noah from the flood and Lot from the destruction of the corrupt city. In Abraham you blessed all peoples” (Praise of the Blessed Trinity).
Even in the midst of the growing chaos in humanity, our Father always found a just man whom He could draw to Himself in a special way, showing Him His favor and saving him from widespread corruption. Read More
457th Meditation
“In your constant goodness you have always sought out man. In Paradise you exclaimed, ‘Adam, where are you?’” (Praise of the Blessed Trinity).
This was our Father’s response to the painful fall of human being, the consequence of which was that sin proliferated and all future generations had to live under the shadow of original sin, except for the Virgin Mary, whom You preserved from the stain of sin so that she could be the bridge across which the Redeemer would come into the world. Read More
456th Meditation
“But man did not remain in his splendor. Tempted by the Evil One, he disobeyed your command and was banished from Paradise” (Hymn of Praise to the Blessed Trinity).
Our Father had made it easy for man… Of all the things that abounded in the beautiful garden of Paradise, only one was forbidden: the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen 2:16-17). But our first parents listened to the lies of the fallen angel, which aroused their sensual and spiritual appetites. Adam and Eve thus disobeyed God’s commandment, with all the consequences our Father had warned them about. What had happened could not be undone: man had listened to seduction and had to leave Paradise. Read More
455th Meditation
“You created angels and men according to Your image. To man You gave Paradise, for him to live in Your presence in holiness and justice” (Praise of the Blessed Trinity).
God’s “cosmos” includes not only His visible creation – the material environment of humankind – but also the invisible creation. Read More
454th Meditation
“All peoples come to worship You and give glory to Your name, because You are the Holy God, living, true and good” (Hymn of Praise to the Most Holy Trinity).
So it should be and so it will be, once the darkness has been separated from the light and our Father has finally restored the order of love in the chaos created by sin. Read More
