DAY 91: MARCH 3

DT 8-9

Deuteronomy 8-9

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)

A Warning Not to Forget God in Prosperity

8 This entire commandment that I command you today you must diligently observe, so that you may live and increase, and go in and occupy the land that the Lord promised on oath to your ancestors.² Remember the long way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, in order to humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments. ³ He humbled you by letting you hunger, then by feeding you with manna, with which neither you nor your ancestors were acquainted, in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.^[a] 4 The clothes on your back did not wear out and your feet did not swell these forty years. ⁵ Know then in your heart that as a parent disciplines a child so the Lord your God disciplines you. ⁶ Therefore keep the commandments of the Lordyour God, by walking in his ways and by fearing him.⁷ For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with flowing streams, with springs and underground waters welling up in valleys and hills, ⁸ a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, ⁹ a land where you may eat bread without scarcity, where you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron and from whose hills you may mine copper. ¹⁰ You shall eat your fill and bless the Lord your God for the good land that he has given you.

¹¹ Take care that you do not forget the Lord your God, by failing to keep his commandments, his ordinances, and his statutes, which I am commanding you today.¹² When you have eaten your fill and have built fine houses and live in them, ¹³ and when your herds and flocks have multiplied, and your silver and gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, ¹⁴ then do not exalt yourself, forgetting the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, ¹⁵ who led you through the great and terrible wilderness, an arid wasteland with poisonous^[b] snakes and scorpions. He made water flow for you from flint rock, ¹⁶ and fed you in the wilderness with manna that your ancestors did not know, to humble you and to test you, and in the end to do you good. ¹⁷ Do not say to yourself, “My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth.” ¹⁸ But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, so that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your ancestors, as he is doing today. ¹⁹ If you do forget the Lord your God and follow other gods to serve and worship them, I solemnly warn you today that you shall surely perish.²⁰ Like the nations that the Lord is destroying before you, so shall you perish, because you would not obey the voice of the Lord your God.

The Consequences of Rebelling against God

9 Hear, O Israel! You are about to cross the Jordan today, to go in and dispossess nations larger and mightier than you, great cities, fortified to the heavens, ² a strong and tall people, the offspring of the Anakim, whom you know. You have heard it said of them, “Who can stand up to the Anakim?” ³ Know then today that the Lord your God is the one who crosses over before you as a devouring fire; he will defeat them and subdue them before you, so that you may dispossess and destroy them quickly, as the Lordhas promised you.

⁴ When the Lord your God thrusts them out before you, do not say to yourself, “It is because of my righteousness that the Lord has brought me in to occupy this land”; it is rather because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is dispossessing them before you. ⁵ It is not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart that you are going in to occupy their land; but because of the wickedness of these nations the Lord your God is dispossessing them before you, in order to fulfill the promise that the Lord made on oath to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.
⁶ Know, then, that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to occupy because of your righteousness; for you are a stubborn people.⁷ Remember and do not forget how you provoked theLord your God to wrath in the wilderness; you have been rebellious against the Lord from the day you came out of the land of Egypt until you came to this place.
⁸ Even at Horeb you provoked the Lord to wrath, and the Lord was so angry with you that he was ready to destroy you. ⁹ When I went up the mountain to receive the stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant that the Lord made with you, I remained on the mountain forty days and forty nights; I neither ate bread nor drank water. ¹⁰ And the Lord gave me the two stone tablets written with the finger of God; on them were all the words that the Lord had spoken to you at the mountain out of the fire on the day of the assembly. ¹¹ At the end of forty days and forty nights the Lord gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant. ¹² Then the Lord said to me, “Get up, go down quickly from here, for your people whom you have brought from Egypt have acted corruptly. They have been quick to turn from the way that I commanded them; they have cast an image for themselves.” ¹³ Furthermore the Lord said to me, “I have seen that this people is indeed a stubborn people. ¹⁴ Let me alone that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven; and I will make of you a nation mightier and more numerous than they.”
¹⁵ So I turned and went down from the mountain, while the mountain was ablaze; the two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands. ¹⁶ Then I saw that you had indeed sinned against the Lord your God, by casting for yourselves an image of a calf; you had been quick to turn from the way that the Lord had commanded you. ¹⁷ So I took hold of the two tablets and flung them from my two hands, smashing them before your eyes. ¹⁸ Then I lay prostrate before theLord as before, forty days and forty nights; I neither ate bread nor drank water, because of all the sin you had committed, provoking the Lord by doing what was evil in his sight. ¹⁹ For I was afraid that the anger that the Lord bore against you was so fierce that he would destroy you. But the Lord listened to me that time also. ²⁰ The Lord was so angry with Aaron that he was ready to destroy him, but I interceded also on behalf of Aaron at that same time. ²¹ Then I took the sinful thing you had made, the calf, and burned it with fire and crushed it, grinding it thoroughly, until it was reduced to dust; and I threw the dust of it into the stream that runs down the mountain.
²² At Taberah also, and at Massah, and at Kibroth-hattaavah, you provoked the Lord to wrath. ²³ And when the Lord sent you from Kadesh-barnea, saying, “Go up and occupy the land that I have given you,” you rebelled against the command of the Lord your God, neither trusting him nor obeying him. ²⁴ You have been rebellious against the Lord as long as he has^[c] known you.
²⁵ Throughout the forty days and forty nights that I lay prostrate before the Lord when the Lord intended to destroy you, ²⁶ I prayed to the Lord and said, “LordGod, do not destroy the people who are your very own possession, whom you redeemed in your greatness, whom you brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand.²⁷ Remember your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; pay no attention to the stubbornness of this people, their wickedness and their sin, ²⁸ otherwise the land from which you have brought us might say, ‘Because the Lord was not able to bring them into the land that he promised them, and because he hated them, he has brought them out to let them die in the wilderness.’ ²⁹ For they are the people of your very own possession, whom you brought out by your great power and by your outstretched arm.”

PS 91

Psalm 91

Assurance of God’s Protection

¹ You who live in the shelter of the Most High,
    who abide in the shadow of the Almighty,^[a]
2 will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress;
    my God, in whom I trust.”
³ For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler
    and from the deadly pestilence;
⁴ he will cover you with his pinions,
    and under his wings you will find refuge;
    his faithfulness is a shield and buckler.
⁵ You will not fear the terror of the night,
    or the arrow that flies by day,
⁶ or the pestilence that stalks in darkness,
    or the destruction that wastes at noonday.

⁷ A thousand may fall at your side,
    ten thousand at your right hand,
    but it will not come near you.
⁸ You will only look with your eyes
    and see the punishment of the wicked.

⁹ Because you have made the Lord your refuge,^[b]
    the Most High your dwelling place,
¹⁰ no evil shall befall you,
    no scourge come near your tent.

¹¹ For he will command his angels concerning you
    to guard you in all your ways.
¹² On their hands they will bear you up,
    so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.
¹³ You will tread on the lion and the adder,
    the young lion and the serpent you will trample under foot.

¹⁴ Those who love me, I will deliver;
    I will protect those who know my name.
¹⁵ When they call to me, I will answer them;
    I will be with them in trouble,
    I will rescue them and honor them.
¹⁶ With long life I will satisfy them,
    and show them my salvation.

ACTS 21. 37-22.16

Acts 21:37-22:16

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)

Paul Defends Himself

³⁷ Just as Paul was about to be brought into the barracks, he said to the tribune, “May I say something to you?” The tribune^[a] replied, “Do you know Greek?³⁸ Then you are not the Egyptian who recently stirred up a revolt and led the four thousand assassins out into the wilderness?” ³⁹ Paul replied, “I am a Jew, from Tarsus in Cilicia, a citizen of an important city; I beg you, let me speak to the people.” ⁴⁰ When he had given him permission, Paul stood on the steps and motioned to the people for silence; and when there was a great hush, he addressed them in the Hebrew^[b]language, saying:

22 “Brothers and fathers, listen to the defense that I now make before you.”

² When they heard him addressing them in Hebrew,^[c]they became even more quiet. Then he said:
³ “I am a Jew, born in Tarsus in Cilicia, but brought up in this city at the feet of Gamaliel, educated strictly according to our ancestral law, being zealous for God, just as all of you are today. ⁴ I persecuted this Way up to the point of death by binding both men and women and putting them in prison, ⁵ as the high priest and the whole council of elders can testify about me. From them I also received letters to the brothers in Damascus, and I went there in order to bind those who were there and to bring them back to Jerusalem for punishment.

Paul Tells of His Conversion

⁶ “While I was on my way and approaching Damascus, about noon a great light from heaven suddenly shone about me. ⁷ I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to me, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ ⁸ I answered, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ Then he said to me, ‘I am Jesus of Nazareth^[d] whom you are persecuting.’ ⁹ Now those who were with me saw the light but did not hear the voice of the one who was speaking to me. ¹⁰ I asked, ‘What am I to do, Lord?’ The Lord said to me, ‘Get up and go to Damascus; there you will be told everything that has been assigned to you to do.’ ¹¹ Since I could not see because of the brightness of that light, those who were with me took my hand and led me to Damascus.
¹² “A certain Ananias, who was a devout man according to the law and well spoken of by all the Jews living there, ¹³ came to me; and standing beside me, he said, ‘Brother Saul, regain your sight!’ In that very hour I regained my sight and saw him. ¹⁴ Then he said, ‘The God of our ancestors has chosen you to know his will, to see the Righteous One and to hear his own voice; ¹⁵ for you will be his witness to all the world of what you have seen and heard. ¹⁶ And now why do you delay? Get up, be baptized, and have your sins washed away, calling on his name.’

CAT 659-667

Article 6

"HE ASCENDED INTO HEAVEN AND IS SEATED AT THE RIGHT HAND OF THE FATHER"

659 "So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God."⁵³¹ Christ's body was glorified at the moment of his Resurrection, as proved by the new and supernatural properties it subsequently and permanently enjoys.⁵³² But during the forty days when he eats and drinks familiarly with his disciples and teaches them about the kingdom, his glory remains veiled under the appearance of ordinary humanity.⁵³³ Jesus' final apparition ends with the irreversible entry of his humanity into divine glory, symbolized by the cloud and by heaven, where he is seated from that time forward at God's right hand.⁵³⁴ Only in a wholly exceptional and unique way would Jesus show himself to Paul "as to one untimely born", in a last apparition that established him as an apostle.⁵³⁵

660 The veiled character of the glory of the Risen One during this time is intimated in his mysterious words to Mary Magdalene: "I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brethren and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God."⁵³⁶ This indicates a difference in manifestation between the glory of the risen Christ and that of the Christ exalted to the Father's right hand, a transition marked by the historical and transcendent event of the Ascension.

661 This final stage stays closely linked to the first, that is, to his descent from heaven in the Incarnation. Only the one who "came from the Father" can return to the Father: Christ Jesus.⁵³⁷ "No one has ascended into heaven but he who descended from heaven, the Son of man."⁵³⁸ Left to its own natural powers humanity does not have access to the "Father's house", to God's life and happiness.⁵³⁹ Only Christ can open to man such access that we, his members, might have confidence that we too shall go where he, our Head and our Source, has preceded us.⁵⁴⁰

662 "and I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself."⁵⁴¹ The lifting up of Jesus on the cross signifies and announces his lifting up by his Ascension into heaven, and indeed begins it. Jesus Christ, the one priest of the new and eternal Covenant, "entered, not into a sanctuary made by human hands. . . but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf."⁵⁴² There Christ permanently exercises his priesthood, for he "always lives to make intercession" for "those who draw near to God through him".⁵⁴³ As "high priest of the good things to come" he is the centre and the principal actor of the liturgy that honours the Father in heaven.⁵⁴⁴

663 Henceforth Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father: "By 'the Father's right hand' we understand the glory and honour of divinity, where he who exists as Son of God before all ages, indeed as God, of one being with the Father, is seated bodily after he became incarnate and his flesh was glorified."⁵⁴⁵

664 Being seated at the Father's right hand signifies the inauguration of the Messiah's kingdom, the fulfilment of the prophet Daniel's vision concerning the Son of man: "To him was given dominion and glory and kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed."⁵⁴⁶ After this event the apostles became witnesses of the "kingdom [that] will have no end".⁵⁴⁷

IN BRIEF

665 Christ's Ascension marks the definitive entrance of Jesus' humanity into God's heavenly domain, whence he will come again (cf ⇒ Acts 1:11); this humanity in the meantime hides him from the eyes of men (cf ⇒ Col 3:3).

666 Jesus Christ, the head of the Church, precedes us into the Father's glorious kingdom so that we, the members of his Body, may live in the hope of one day being with him for ever.

667 Jesus Christ, having entered the sanctuary of heaven once and for all, intercedes constantly for us as the mediator who assures us of the permanent outpouring of the Holy Spirit.