DAILY- HOMILY

September 24, 2017 - 25th SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

Green

Is 55: 6- 9 / Phil: 20c- 24, 27 / Mt 20: 1-16a

FROM THE FIRST READING:          Is 55: 6- 8

     Seek Yahweh while he may be found; call to him while he is near. Let the wicked abandon his way, let him forsake his thoughts, let him turn to Yahweh for he will have mercy, for our God is generous in forgiving.

     For my thoughts are not your thoughts, my ways are not your ways, says Yahweh.

GOSPEL READING:           Mt 20: 1 - 16a

     Jesus said to his disciples, "This story throws light on the kingdom of heaven. A landowner went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay the workers a salary of a silver coin for the day, and sent them to his vineyard.

     "He went out again at about nine in the morning, and seeing others idle in the square, he said to them, 'You, too, go to my vineyard and I will pay you what is just.' ...

     "The owner went out at midday and again at three in the afternoon, and he did the same. Finally, he went out at the last working hour- it was the eleventh - and he saw others standing there.... The master said, 'Go and work in my vineyard.'

     "When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his manager, 'Call the workers and pay them their wage, beginning with the last and ending with the first.' Those who had come to work at the eleventh hour turned up and were given a denarius each (a silver coin). When it was the turn of the first, they thought they would receive more. But they, too, received a denarius each. So, on receiving it, they began to grumble against the landowner.

     "They said, 'These last hardly worked an hour, yet you have treated them the same as us who had endured the day's burden and heat.' The owner said to one of them, 'Friend, I have not been unjust to you. Did you not agree on a denarius a day? So take what is yours and go. I want to give to the last the same as I give to you. Don't I have the right to do as I please with my money? Why are you envious when I am kind?'

     "So will it be: the last will be first, the first will be last."

REFLECTION

     The first reading from the prophet Isaiah and the Gospel reading tell us that God is a generous God. This generous God is different from selfish man: "my thoughts are not your thoughts, my ways are not your ways, says Yahweh."

     There is a truly great gap between God and man: I am so unlike God. This should make me feel even smaller than ever. But I take the Lord's invitation, "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call on him while he is near." So God is not far after all. I only have to look for him. I need only to call him. But truer still is that it is God who finds me rather than I find him; it is God who listens

     All this we experience in Jesus. In Jesus, God is near. He is Emmanuel, God­ with-us. God is in our midst; God dwells in and with us. This is the generosity of God, that he gave us his only begotten Son. There is no gift which can surpass his Gift to us. And there is nothing which God will not give us after he has given us his only begotten Son. God's generosity is limitless. He has given us his Son to be one of us, so we can be one with him.

     The reality of the reign of God is here. God wants our active participation. He wants us to work in his vineyard, not as hired laborers but as children of the generous Father. We do not work out our salvation in fear and trembling but in love and hope. We turn to God for his grace and his mercy, especially when we fall.

WE PRAY FOR MTQ DAILY PRAYER INTENTIONS:

BIRTHDAY

     DINNA A. RAMOS

     NENA GO

WEDDING ANNIVERSARY 

     JUANITO & STELLA TEJADA DY

IN MEMORIAM (†)

     PETER LIM JR. (JUN 28,1927 ·SEP 24, 1997)

Finally, we pray for one another, for those who have asked our prayers and for those who need our prayers the most. 

Have a good day!

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