Are You Jesus?

(Prayer offered on the Public Address system for the entire La Salle Academy educational community on Friday morning, 15 April 2016)

Good morning.

We pause and we remember that we are in the holy presence of God.

I recently read a book by Matthew Kelly which has a story about someone who was rushing around trying to make a flight at the airport with his friends. So they ran out the building to get a taxi and ran right into a woman selling food from a produce cart. All of the fruits and vegetables were strewn all over the sidewalk. As the friends encouraged him to keep going, he looked back and noticed that the woman was blind and just stood there with tears streaming down her face.  Despite the friends screaming to him to get in the taxi, he told them to go on without him. He returned to the woman and started picking up the food and neatly organizing it on the cart. The woman turned to him and said, “Are you Jesus?” He was startled and said, “No, of course not!” The woman said, “Oh, because I just prayed for Jesus to help me, and you showed up.”

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When was the last time someone confused us with Jesus? Was there a time recently where we ignored our friends in order to do what we know was the right thing? Have we neglected some of the corporal or spiritual works of mercy because we’re rushing to the busyness of our lives?

Have we ever given food, drink, clothing, or shelter to those in need? What about comforting someone who’s sick or imprisoned, or been with a friend when someone close to them has died? Have we helped someone to understand, to see the error of their ways, been patient with those who’ve wronged us and forgiven them? Or even just prayed for someone other than ourselves?

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If so, you have been like Jesus and practiced works of mercy. Congratulations! But have there been other times when the opportunity to do any of these was there, and yet we were too busy to do anything?

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If we want to be the change in the world that we wish to see and be the best version of ourselves, then these works of mercy are the best guidelines we have. Even when we fail, God still loves us, but wouldn’t it be a wonderful world if we all acted more like His son, Jesus?

Let us pray.

Dear Father, We sometimes stumble in being your children and following your truth and beauty. Transform our hearts to put on compassion, kindness, and humility. Help us to stop our busyness of foolish things and to be more like your Son, so that our actions might cause someone to say of us, “Are you Jesus?”

St. John Baptist de La Salle, pray for us.

Live  Jesus  in our hearts, forever!

Leslie Martinelli–Science teacher