Welcome to Finding God in Our Hearts. The following production, Pastoral Reflections with Monsignor Don Fisher is a weekly program of deep spiritual insight on Scripture, revealing the indwelling presence of God. We appreciate your listenership and if you find this program valuable, please subscribe and share with your friends. Share this program is funded with kind donations by listeners just like you. Make your donation@pastoralreflectionsinstitute.com the opening prayer O God, on this day through your only begotten Son, have conquered death and unlocked for us the path to eternity. Grant, we pray, that we who keep the solemnity of the Lord’s resurrection may, through the renewal brought by your Spirit, rise up in the light of life through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God forever and ever.
Amen. A Reading from the Acts of the apostles 10th chapter, 34th verse in the 37th to 43rd verse, Peter proceeded to speak and said, you know what has happened all over Judea. Beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power. He went about doing good and healing all those oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him. We are witnesses of all that he did, both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree.
This man God raised on the third day and granted that he be visible not to all the people, but to us, the witnesses chosen by God in advance, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. He commissioned us to preach to the people and testify that he is the one appointed by God as judge of of the living and the dead to Him. All the prophets bear witness that everyone believes in Him, Receive forgiveness of sins through his name, the Word of the Lord. This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad. Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endures forever.
Let the house of Israel say, his mercy endures forever. This is the day the LORD has made. Let us rejoice and be glad. The right hand of the LORD has struck with power. The right hand of the Lord is exalted. I shall not die, but live and declare the works of the Lord.
This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad. The stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone by the Lord this has been done. It is wonderful in our eyes. This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be Glad.
A reading from St. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. 5, 6, 8. Brothers and sisters, do you not know that a little yeast leavens all the dough? Clear out the old yeast so that you may become a fresh batch of dough, inasmuch as you are unleavened. For our Paschal Lamb, Christ has been sacrificed.
Therefore let us celebrate the feast not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. The word of the Lord. Hallelujah. Verse. Christ, our Paschal Lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us then feast with joy in the Lord.
Alleluia. The Gospel is taken from St. John, 20th chapter, first through the ninth verse. On the first day of the week, Mary Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark, and saw the stone removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved and told them, they have taken the Lord from the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him. So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb.
They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first. He bent down and saw the bare of cloths there, but did not go in. When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths, but rolled up in a separate place. The other disciples also went in. The one who had arrived at the tomb first. He saw and believed, for they did not yet understand the Scripture, that he had to rise from the dead.
The Gospel of the Lord Take the next few moments as we listen to this music to ponder the images and the thoughts that come to you as you listen to these readings. What did Jesus do on the cross? Why did he have to die? And why was his death so important to the human race? It’s clear that then, one of the things that Jesus did was to expose evil for what it is and show it in its true light as something that has to destroy that which gives life. Jesus is life.
He is the light of the world. He is the way we are supposed to live. And yet evil that existed in the world in a way that was more powerful than human beings had done its work to separate people, isolate people, put people at odds with other people. Evil has one single intention. To destroy the plan of God. And what is that plan for you and for me?
That’s revealed in this death and Resurrection is. He wants more than anything else for us to be empowered in a way that evil no longer can have power over us. Evil is stronger than human beings, but God is stronger than evil. And until the death and resurrection of Jesus, that strength wasn’t shared with human beings as it is now. Since the death and resurrection of Jesus, we have been empowered. And how does it work?
Well, I don’t think it’s hard for us to look at the world today and say there are things going on that seem so destructive and wrong. People using their power to take away freedom from other people. People hating each other because they think differently, wanting to attack each other because they think their way is the only way. It’s all showing some kind of really negative energy that has got to be destroyed. And I say that by wanting to say so clearly. It has been destroyed.
And so what’s the name we give to it? And it seems so simple, because 90% of what Jesus taught throughout his whole life was on one theme. Forgiveness. Being in a state of mind, a state of our hearts, where we want nothing more than reconciliation. We don’t want to have revenge or retaliation or destruction any longer. We want unity and oneness.
And that is a promise that God has placed in our hearts. But unless we believe it’s there, unless we want it to be there, we limit its power. Forgiveness is a way of life. It is recognizing something that has been promised by God, that he is stronger than anything else that would be a source of destruction. And you know, when you watch people destroying each other or trying to destroy each other, when you feel that that is the way things really are, if we give that power to the enemy. You know, Judas is a very interesting player in the whole Easter story.
And the word to betray is to give someone to give in to the enemy. And Judas is a real interesting figure because you look at him, and one of the things that he was caught up in is lying about who he is. I mean, he posed as the caretaker of the money, and yet he was not doing that. He was sucking things out of it for himself. And he was caught in evil. And when Jesus gave him communion at the Lord’s Supper, Satan entered into him.
And what did Satan do to him when he entered into him fully? The only thing that happened that we can see so clearly is that he went, Judas went and hanged himself. It is an attitude that when we’re in, ultimately seeks to destroy. To name that darkness, to name it is so important. And to name it and then to know what the way out of it is, and it’s simple. Don’t become like the enemy.
If the enemy wants to destroy you, then you want to destroy the enemy. And when you try to destroy evil, it backfires when you try to destroy another person because they’re not who you want them to be. Separate from them. Reject them. We’re playing into the game. The opening prayer of this liturgy so clearly said, there’s something that needs to be unlocked.
And Jesus unlocked it. On the cross. He gave in to evil. Not that he said it was good or that it was right. He just gave into it in the sense that he refused to be like evil itself. He did not retaliate.
He did not want to destroy those people destroying him. He. He loved them. He forgave them. He stayed one with them. And in that process, he infused life into them.
We can infuse light and life into our enemies if we choose not to retaliate against them or not to want them to be destroyed, but want them to be transformed. What a gift. A gift that seems oversimplified in some ways, but then in other ways, it is so powerful. Stop resentment. Stop hating. Learn to accept and learn to love and learn to bring life and light.
That’s the mystery of Easter. The Closing prayer Father, we give you thanks for our redemption. We don’t fully understand it. It’s hard to grasp. But I know somehow that the power of evil that you have allowed to be part of our life is no longer able to overcome us. And we have within us the power and the strength to use it for the good, to learn and to grow and not to become what it is.
You saved us from a life of destruction and drawn us into a life of great goodness. Bless us with that awareness that we can live it every day of our lives. And we ask this in Jesus name, Amen. I have enjoyed very much being a part of your Lenten season by my daily reflections on Scripture that is taken from the scriptures of that day. And what I love about it is that it gives me not only a chance to share something with you each day, but it really does remind me of when I was a pastor and how I was so able to be there with you on daily Mass and Sunday Mass. And it just seems to complete the fullness of what these readings are all about.
So I want to continue that for every day of the year. So I’ll continue on Easter Monday and then continue with the rest of the year. And as long as I’m around, as long as I’m alive, I will be able to do that for you and even for me. So thank you for being a part of that. Please subscribe so that you can have it every day. God bless you.
The music in our program was composed and produced by Ryan Harner for this show. Pastoral Reflections with Monsignor Don Fisher is funded with kind donations by listeners just like you. You can make a one time or recurring tax deductible donation on our website, pastoral reflectionsinsinsinsinsinstitute.com we thank you for your listenership and your continued support. Without it, this program would not be possible. Pastoral Reflections with Monsignor Don Fisher is a production of the Pastoral Reflections Institute, a nonprofit in Dallas, Texas, dedicated to enriching your spiritual journey. Executive Producer Monsignor Don Fisher produced by Kyle Cross and recorded in Pastoral Reflections Institute Studios.
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