Living the letter of the Law brings death

Heb. 8:6-13, Mk 3:13-19. In today's Gospel, Jesus going up the mountain with the twelve Apostles chosen to be leaders evokes memories of Moses going up Mount Sinai to receive God’s law and covenant. Mountains were a favourable place for prayer and for locating sanctuaries. To find motivation for living the new covenant, we need to value quiet prayer, to find our security in the Lord. That scene evokes awareness of God’s presence in our lives, letting Him touch our hearts and motives. This can renew our outlook and help us to a new covenant, which will be vibrant with the presence of Jesus. Even if today's first reading views the Mosaic covenant as obsolete, the early Christians felt a link between the two covenants.

When God made a new covenant with the house of Israel, it did not empty the Mosaic law of all meaning, for Jesus often says that He came to fulfil the Old Testament law and the Prophets. What is obsolete is the spirit of rigidity and its interpretation which is devoid of the true spirit of love and compassion of God projected. To follow the letter of the law kills but to follow the spirit of the law gives life. We try to conform our wills to God’s will, not as slaves but as children, not for seeking reward but to express love and gratitude, not for external show but for inner peace. Even the smallest demand of the law is fulfilled in essence when a Christian lives in a loving spirit. The covenant is lived amid the the different condition of human life.

As we accept this new day as the gift of God, may the Lord give us the insight to see His hand at work in everything, so that we may live in newness of life! Amen!! Be safe, peace be with you!!!