Fifteenth Sunday of the Year Isaiah 55: 10-11; Romans 8: 18-23; Matthew 13: 1-9
“I think that what we suffer in this life can never be compared to the glory, as yet unrevealed, which is waiting for us. The whole creation is eagerly waiting for God to reveal his sons and daughters. We too, who possess the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait for our bodies to be set free.”
Saint Paul was no stranger to suffering. Within his own ministry he had experienced rejection and isolation, and had come to terms with his own weakness and frailty. In all of this, an unshakeable hope grounded his faith in the Lord. The strength of that hope was to be found not in himself, but in his Lord. At a time when the whole world has been confronted with its own frailty, and is desperately seeking for signs of hope, we can learn much from Saint Paul. In his own life and ministry, the strife and disintegration of the church in Corinth, a community that he had founded, must have brought his confidence to its lowest ebb. Speaking from that experience he wrote as follows.
