Catholic Bible Study Made Simple

Sometimes we find God’s truth and His ways unbelievable. We ask, “Why did He do that? Why did He choose me or that person?” God’s ways are not ours. His surpass ours in their perfection. One of the ways He expresses His perfection is in the way He deals with us, the way of love.  His love is selfless, for our benefit, not His. Like God, our way of dealing with others, especially those we find difficult, should be for their benefit, not ours.

Sometimes we are like the people in the first reading who hear God’s word and realize how far we are from the mark. Hopefully, we have encouragers in our lives as they did. Sometimes we are excited as were those in the gospel reading. However, as we shall see next week, their excitement turned to anger when they heard the full message.  Regardless of what we see the other members of the Body of Christ doing, we are to do our part in the Body and encourage others to do theirs. This is an essential part of the gospel.

“Do whatever he tells you” are Mary’s last words recorded in the scriptures. She speaks these words to us as well. If we obey what Jesus tells us to do, we can expect results as the servants at the wedding feast did—perhaps not as spectacular as the servants at the wedding feast did, but life-changing results in our lives and the lives of those around us. God loves us and wants to demonstrate His love for us. Sometimes that means doing things that don’t make sense to us.

What we fail to realize at times is that, when we were baptized, the Spirit of God not only fell on us but also came to dwell in us; and God the Father said to us and those around us, “This is my beloved Son, Daughter”. These readings are an invitation to us to recall these facts and to thank the Father for loving us so much that we were baptized and that His Only-Begotten Son was sent, baptized, and lived out His mission so that we might join Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for all eternity.

It is one thing to say that Jesus is Lord. It is another to acknowledge Him as Lord and King in the sense that the scriptures were written. Our modern minds reject the notion of anyone with absolute authority and power. Yet this is who the Savior is.

We are more like the Jewish leaders than the magi. We are so busy with daily life that we fail to recognize the One who is in our midst and treat Him as He deserves.

The Church uses the readings to teach us God’s standards for family life—even among the messier things of family life: how one honors father and mother, how one treats spouse and children, how to love.

Even if these readings do not describe your family of origin, you are still expected to live up to these standards.

“Lord, make us turn to you; let us see your face and we shall be saved”, the responsorial psalm proclaims. The face of God is the face of Jesus. Jesus is the light of the world. In that light we can see our lives and the world around us from God’s perspective. Then we are enabled to do whatever it is that God desires us to do. That is what Mary did in the Gospel. Though she had received shocking news that could have turned her focus inward, she turned her focus toward Elizabeth. She is an example not only of how we should live but also that such a life is possible.

Happy Gaudete Sunday. Gaudete is Latin for rejoice. The second reading tells us to rejoice always—even when one doesn’t think the circumstances call for rejoicing. From a biblical perspective, joy, like peace, is something only found internally, not externally. There can be seeming peace and joy all around us, and we can still not be peaceful and joyful. Let us pray for God’s peace and joy.

God desires to take us from where we are, with whatever miseries and bondages we are experiencing, into the midst of His Kingdom. He is our deliverer, our redeemer. That is why He has throughout the ages sent human messengers to proclaim His desire for us, and He still does that today. During Advent John the Baptist is the messenger that we hear about most. What many of us fail to comprehend is that we need to accept our deliverance and become John the Baptist to others

The First Sunday of Advent begins a new liturgical year—the year in which the primary source for the gospels is Luke. The Church ended its liturgical year by urging us to be prepared for Christ’s second coming, to live our lives each day, each moment, as if it were our last. In preparing to celebrate His first coming, the Church uses readings that deal with the second coming to remind us to begin with the end in mind—our earthly death and entry into eternal life.

If you were told that you were to have a king, and absolute monarch, in your life, would you want it to be Jesus is that King. Life goes better if we recognize that He is King and we desire His kingship.

Are you ready for the second coming of Christ? These scriptures seem to indicate that even the elect will not escape the calamities that are prophesied to happen before His return.  We are called to be knowledgeable of what God has told us and alert for the signs.

Many of us have decent relationships with God; however, few of us are trusting enough in God’s provision to do what the widows in these readings did, give everything they had to God and His representative. More amazing is that the widow of the first reading was probably a pagan.

How many gods do you have in your life: money, power, position, or any of the others our world suggests that we should place before all else in our lives? Or do you place the LORD God first in your life? Do you have a loving relationship with Him? These readings call us to place the true God first in our lives and to love Him. Out of that love is to flow love for His children around us.

God as Father demonstrated His great love for us by sending His Son to redeem us. Jesus is the perfect High Priest. He continues that role by continuously interceding for us with the Father.

Jesus came to heal and to free. That continues to be His role. Consider what inside you that needs to be healed. Where is your spiritual blindness? What is it that has you in bondage that you cannot be free to be the person that God not only created you to be but calls you to be every day?

Jesus has the answer. Jesus is the answer.

What is it you ask of Jesus? Is it something as self-serving as James and John’s request? Unfortunately, too often we ask God for what we want to satisfy our desires, not God’s. We want, power, prestige, recognition, authority, wealth, and at the end eternal life; but I want these now. Jesus’ call to us is different.

“You call me Teacher and Lord; and you are right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.” (John 13:13–14, RSV2CE)

“If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you.” (John 15:10–14, RSV2CE)

“[T]he wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, without uncertainty or insincerity.” (James 3:17, RSV2CE) Why do we so often seek the wisdom of this world and the things that this world says we should? We allow ourselves to be deceived because we do not use the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, as a means of separating what is false from what is true.

We are to repent of, turn around from, our faulty way of thinking we must have our hearts and minds renewed by the Word that has been given to us, believe it, and live by it.

Our culture says that marriage is a matter of convenience rather than a covenant relationship established by God. Genuine marriage is between two parties who are committed to laying down their lives for each other.

In Jesus’ day, the idea of a throw away marriage was common as well. Jesus reminds the religious leaders that it was because of the hardness of Hebrew hearts that Moses allowed divorce.

Our issue with God’s law may not lie with marriage, but most of us have areas of hardness in our hearts that question the truth of what God has said about one area or another of our lives.

Jesus laid down His life for His bride, the Church. If we are to be imitators of Christ Jesus, we must lay down our lives for our spouses.

Our God is a God of surprises. He surprised the Israelite leaders in the first reading. He surprised the disciples in the gospel reading. And He didn’t ask anyone’s permission to pull off His surprise. Nor did He care if what He did didn’t follow and expected way of doing things.

Unwarranted disgust can result when God does not do things the way we expect Him to, especially if He choses to use someone we think not worthy of His choosing, someone who is not a member of the club.

We are much better disciples when we allow God to be God and satisfy ourselves for the part He has given us to play rather than comparing ourselves with other and judging their worth.

The second reading calls us to account for our attitudes and actions, as does most of the Letter of James. He was a follower of Jesus; and surely, he observed the words and actions of the apostles as they jockeyed for position and attempted to force their views upon Jesus.

This should give us hope. If those who were closest to Jesus were unable to receive, understand, and live the message, why are we surprised that we are not consistent in our Christian life. It was only the Holy Spirit who changed their way of thinking, understanding, and living. The Holy Spirit can do the same for us.

What do you say to Jesus when He, either directly or through His Church, tells you something you don’t want to hear? If you tell Him that this just can’t be the case, you are like Peter in the gospel. And Peter only a little while before had gotten the answer to Jesus’ question right. Even though Peter was reprimanded for telling Jesus that what He said couldn’t happen and Jesus rebuked him, Peter did not stop following Jesus. “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life; and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” (John 6:68–69, RSV2CE)

The response that Jesus is looking for from us is to ask Him to open our ears and our hearts to what He has to say. And as James insists, that means that we must do what He tells us.

"There is no favouritism with God." (Romans 2:11, NJB) James tells us that favoritism and distinctions between believers is to be avoided. If God does show favoritism, it is for the vulnerable. And when He shows that favoritism, it is often done in a manner that confounds conventional wisdom.

We are called to open ourselves to God’s work in our lives. God wants to heal us of those things that make us less whole as human beings—whether that is our deafness, our bondages, our inability or unwillingness to follow Him.

“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I go to the Father.” (John 14:12, RSV2CE) This is not only a promise; it is also a challenge. Do you believe enough to take on this challenge from Jesus?

Jesus told us that if we love Him we will keep His word. (cf. Jn 14:23). In the first reading Moses tells the people that they should not add or subtract from what God told him to tell them. Human nature is such that we would prefer to craft God’s word to us to suit our desires. That is not submitting to the word that had been planted in us. And if we do not submit, we will be unable to bear the fruit that we have been created to bear.

These scriptures tell us it is time to make a decision as to whom we choose to follow—God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirt, or the world, the flesh, and the devil. The world can be the way we were taught to live, the way we lived in the past, or the world in which we live now. We are called to live either by fleshly standards or standards of the Spirit. We are called to stand up to and rejects the temptations of the Evil One.

It is easy to choose the path of least resistance, to choose to follow human logic, to yield to pre-conceived notions and the desire to satisfy our own desire. This is not the life to which we are called as followers of Jesus.

Mary models for us the life that Jesus calls us to live. She also models the reward that Jesus has in mind for us—eternal life with him. Mary’s assumption gives us hope that Jesus’ promise will be fulfilled for us.

In our times, it is difficult to avoid the talking heads spouting human wisdom rather than wisdom that comes from God. These talking heads may be promoting secular or religious human wisdom. It is difficult to differentiate between truth, falsehood, half-truths, and opinion. It can be even more difficult to discern wisdom that comes from God; because, to our human minds, it is beyond our experience and therefore unbelievable.

Elijah had slain 450 prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel, but was afraid of Jezebel. Still, God provided for Him and sent him to Horeb so that He could give Elijah his next assignment.

The people who experienced the miracle of being fed physically could neither understand nor accept Jesus’ telling them that He would feed them spiritually.

Are we, as a people of God, much different from Elijah or the crowd who grumbled against Jesus? We can be with faith that looks beyond what we see with our eyes, hear with our ears, and comprehend with our minds. “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1, RSV2CE)

These readings a reminder of human nature since the fall. Whatever God gives us, we always want more. Deliverance from Egypt was not sufficient; the Israelites wanted the benefits of Egypt without the slavery. The people in the gospel reading wanted to eat as sumptuously as they did from the five loaves and the two fish. The reading from Ephesians reminds us that with the salvation that Jesus has brought, we are called to make changes in our lives and our expectations of life.

Many of our problems arise because we insist upon seeing things from a human perspective rather than from God’s perspective. When we do this, we see that we do not have enough—enough money, enough talent, enough time, enough grace, enough of whatever it is that we think that we need at that time. If we would stop worrying and allow God to be God, we might see that we not only have enough but more than enough.

These readings tell us that not everyone who appears in the role of shepherd is a good shepherd. Jesus alone is the ultimate Good Shepherd, and He is the one who will bring all the sheep back to His fold and minister to them in the way that they should be treated.

Most of us have some for whom we are shepherds. This is an occasion to examine ourselves honestly, and perhaps with the help of another, to determine where we model the Good Shepherd and where we do not.

Implied also is that each of us has been given one or more human shepherd. Just how well do we live out the directions of these shepherds and the Good Shepherd?

The reading from Ephesians speaks of six blessings that are ours because of Jesus’ death, resurrection, and the sending of the Holy Spirit. By nature of our baptism, we are all priest, prophet, and king; and we share the command to be Jesus’ witness that was given to the apostles. Sometimes performing that assignment we are successful like the apostles in the gospels. Sometimes we are rejected like Amos in the first reading. Regardless of the response or the outcome, our obeying Jesus’ commands are a necessary part of the life of the disciple.

Just because God asks us to do something does not mean that it will be successful by human standards. Nor does He expect it to do it by our own efforts. No, He expects obedience from us and complete dependence upon Him to achieve the results He desires.

When God completed creation on the sixth day, everything was perfect. Adam and Eve had been warned that death was a consequence of eating of the forbidden fruit. Thus, all forms of imperfection entered into creation are the result of their sin. When Jesus walked the earth, He showed that He as God has the power to reverse the consequences of that first sin. God does not change, and His Son still wants to reverse the consequences of sin—that of our first parents and our own.

Every life has its storms. One may either panic because they cannot be controlled by human efforts, or choose to believe that God is in control and that there is no need for panic, anxiety, or worry. God’s word tells us that He has done this for others in the past. Why should He not be able to do this in the present time? If we are a new creation as a result of our baptisms, we are a new creation who is capable of faith that changes our belief systems about ourselves, our lives, and what God is capable of doing in our lives.

One potential message from these readings is to achieve your purpose in life no matter how small or how large. God gives us everything we need to achieve that purpose. Do not limit yourself to how you, or perhaps the world sees you. God isn’t done with you yet. To look at yourself today can bring either pride or discouragement. Give yourself unreservedly to God. Let Him worry about the outcome.

In years past this solemnity was known as Corpus Christi, the Body of Christ. There are only four cities in the world named Corpus Christi, and all of them are in the western hemisphere. Corpus Christi, Texas is so named, because it was discovered on this feast day in 1519.

We have the opportunity to rediscover, or perhaps discover, the truth beauty and power of the body and blood of Christ. Let us all do this this year that we may discover the power and salvation that Jesus has given us through the Eucharist.

The Trinity is in scripture beginning with the first few verses. We see it again at Jesus’ baptism. Jesus gives it to us when He tells the apostles the formula for baptism.

The concept of one God with three persons is difficult if not impossible for humans to fully grasp. That is why it is called a mystery. It is a matter of faith to believe in the Trinity.

“[L]ike living stones be yourselves built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5, RSV2CE) This a description of the unity that the Spirit wishes to make of us. We, individuals that we are, are called to live next to others bonded together by the glue that the Spirit brings. The Spirit also brings life to the lifeless stones that we are.

To be truly filled with the Spirit is to allow him full continual access to every area of our lives. Most of us want to hold something back or don’t want some gift or some neighboring stone that the Spirit gives us.

May this be the Pentecost that the Spirit removes our hearts of stone and gives us hearts of flesh (cf. Ezk 36:26-27). May this be the Pentecost when we allow the Spirit to make us true one, united to each other in Christ.

The apostles must have been conflicted. They were probably happy that Jesus was going back to His Father, but they were probably sad that they would not see Him again. Also, although Jesus gave last minute instructions before His departure, they would not grasp what He was saying until they experienced Pentecost. These might be words to describe us today when we encounter Jesus. How unchanged is human nature over the centuries?

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16, RSV2CE) This is probable the most quoted verse in the New Testament. And it not just some that God wishes to be saved and have eternal life. “[God] desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” (1 Timothy 2:4, RSV2CE)

If we believe this, why do we reject God’s love for us by demanding that He love us in the manner that we choose? Why, if we are called to love as He loves, do we refuse to love others as ourselves? Tough questions that we often refuse to consider and answer.

All of us are somewhere—somewhere we remain, abide, dwell, or even stuck. These readings call us to remain in Jesus and to allow Him to remain in us. That is the only way we can bear the fruit that we have been created to bear.

The refrain of a hymn based on the 23rd Psalm says, “Shepherd me, O God, beyond my wants, beyond my fears, from death into life.” This is what the Good Shepherd wants to do for us. Unfortunately, we often are more like some of the sheep Phillip Keller describes in his book A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23: obstinate, self-willed, rebellious. We do not need to be that way.

Ignorance is a common malady for human beings. Sometimes the ignorance is deliberate, other times it is accidental due to lack of experience on our parts. More frequently ignorance is a result of clinging to pre-conceived notions and a refusal to let go of them. In these readings we are called to let go of what is inhibiting our belief in God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—and what He tells us either directly or through His chosen servants. Perhaps the greater challenge is to believe and then act consistently in accordance with our beliefs.

“Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, his love is everlasting.” (Response) Do we thank God enough for the mercy He has shown us, not only in the big things but in the little as well? Draw hope from the mercy that Jesus showed Thomas when he doubted the testimony of the other apostles regarding Jesus’ appearance to them.

Jesus wants to show us His mercy to us for all our missing the mark that He has established for us. Let us come to Him for mercy. Let us believe that He wants to show us mercy. Let us accept the mercy He shows us. We needn’t deserve His mercy. We could never deserve His mercy. Yet He graciously bestows His mercy upon us because of His infinite love for us.

Jesus raised people from the dead during His public ministry. When the time came, His Father raised Jesus from the dead. This is good news for us, because the Father will raise us from the dead too on the last day since we are His children as well. For our part we are called to live like children of God.

The Mass readings can be found here:

It is beneficial to examine the passion story to determine if we can identify ourselves as one of the people who were a part of it. Perhaps we will see ourselves in Peter, or the members of the Sanhedrin, or perhaps John, or one of the women at the cross. When we do, we may either find encouragement or motivation to change our lives.

The Mass readings can be found here:

We may want to see Jesus; however, do we want to see the Jesus who is; or do we want to see the Jesus we prefer? We may want to follow Jesus; however, we prefer that He only require outward observance without a change of heart. To see Jesus, we must see Jesus crucified. To follow Jesus, we must die to self.

The Mass readings can be found here:

God does not abide by our rules to accomplish His plans. He uses a pagan like Cyrus, king of Persia, to free the Jews from Babylonian captivity. He chooses the cross to free us from our sin and the sin of Adam. Are we willing to allow God to have His way, or are we going to refuse His gift to us because it is not coming in the manner we desire or through the person we desire?

The Mass readings can be found here:

In the gospel, Jesus cleanses the temple to return it to it intended holiness. In lent we are called to allow Jesus to cleanse the temple that is us to restore it to His intended holiness for us. He has given us His commandments as instruction concerning the kind of thoughts, words, and actions that will help us to become and remain that holy.

The Mass readings can be found here:

Jesus showed Himself to Peter, James, and John as He had been for all eternity. He had been showing himself through the Old Testament in passages such as the sacrifice of Isaac. On the Mount of Transfiguration, He showed Himself in a new light. He wants to reveal Himself to us too. Are we willing to go with Him where He leads us so that He can do that?

The Mass readings can be found here:

Jesus must have had what we would call a spiritual high after His baptism and His Father calling Him, His beloved Son; but immediately, the Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness for forty days of preparation for His mission of ministry.

Why are we surprised when, after a spiritual high, we have a period in which we feel as though we are in a hot, dry desert or being nearly drowned as Noah must have during the flood. Yet we, too, may need a time of preparation for some next phase or life; and when we are in preparation, we should not be surprised if we come under all types of attack instigated by our enemy the devil.

The Mass readings can be found here: