'Living Lent': Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Lent - Day 28

PRAY:
"God is our refuge and our strength, an ever present help in distress. Therefore we fear not, though the earth be shaken and mountains plunge into the depths of the sea." (Psalm 26:2-3)

READING: John 5:2-9

2 Now in Jerusalem next to the Sheep Pool there is a pool called Bethesda in Hebrew, which has five porticos;

3 and under these were crowds of sick people, blind, lame, paralysed.

4 for at intervals the angel of the Lord came down into the pool, and the water was disturbed, and the first person to enter the water after this disturbance was cured of any ailment he suffered from.

5 One man there had an illness which had lasted thirty-eight years,

6 and when Jesus saw him lying there and knew he had been in that condition for a long time, he said, 'Do you want to be well again?'

7 'Sir,' replied the sick man, 'I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is disturbed; and while I am still on the way, someone else gets down there before me.'

8 Jesus said, 'Get up, pick up your sleeping-mat and walk around.'

9 The man was cured at once, and he picked up his mat and started to walk around.

MEDITATION:
The man by the pool waited there for 38 years. He had perfected his excuse for why he was still not healed. What excuses have we perfected for not healing ourselves? When we refrain from attending Mass, or receiving the Sacrament of Reconciliation, we are making excuses for ourselves. We can end up going for long periods of time without healing. What excuses do I make for myself?

LET US PRAY:
Lord, we know I have often made excuses for myself when I have been unwilling to try. Please pardon my excuses. Please grant me the healing I seek.

ACTION:
I will attend reconciliation and Mass as soon as I am able, and I will not make excuses for myself. I will avail myself of the healing offered by Christ.