Daily reflection _ shine like the sun

"SHINE LIKE THE SUN"  
Fire is a powerful force. It destroys and creates simultaneously, refining what's good and eliminating what is unnecessary... Jesus words are filled with a picture of judgement but behind his words there is victory! 
Deacon John Ruscheinsky
In today's first reading from the Book of Exodus, we hear something which the Catechism considers pivotal. "God hears Moses' prayer of intercession and agrees to walk in the midst of an unfaithful people." Does God's name express God's patience? "The Lord, the Lord, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity, continuing his kindness for a thousand generations, and forgiving wickedness and crime and sin. These qualities of our heavenly Father, elaborations of the divine name, are reprised in today's Responsorial Psalm.
 In the Gospel of Matthew is Jesus' final word in a parable about seed sown, weeds that grow alongside the seeds, and a great harvest yet to come. Fire is a powerful force. It destroys and creates simultaneously, refining what's good and eliminating what is unnecessary. God's love has the power to do that in our lives with the mesmerizing effect. But how do you know that fire is burning? God makes smoke which signals that is where He is working in our lives. In our modern day the fiery furnace blazes with the same heat that Daniel's three friends endured. And the light from the righteous who shine like the sun reflects Daniels vision of a day when God's purpose for the world will overcome evil, sin and even death itself. In the life of the age to come, sin and death will be burned away. Jesus words are filled with a picture of judgement but behind his words there is victory! God's presence is in our midst. Where there's smoke, there's fire----the fire of God's love.
 "Shine Like The Sun!"