Dear Friends in Christ,
This week I had the pleasure of finding an online news article that was especially heartwarming. The events retold in the article illustrate the lesson of this Sunday’s gospel very well.
A man was traveling in his car towards an intersection and, as he entered the intersection, he saw a vehicle there with a door being opened. As the man watched further, he saw that a small, black puppy was being dropped out of that vehicle into the street. The man found a place to park
and went into the intersection on foot. There, the puppy approached him, wagging his tail. The man knew that he had to rescue the pup and brought him home, though he is allergic to dogs. In an interview, the man made it clear that he will care for the puppy until he finds his “forever home”
with a family.
The gospel passage for this Sunday, Luke 15:1-10, is about finding lost things, namely a sheep and a coin. In both parables, Jesus emphasizes how much effort and care people showed when trying to find the lost things and how much joy they experienced when they located what was lost. Jesus tells us that this is like how God feels joy when sinners return to him.
In the story of the abandoned puppy, the man who found him was observant and willing to go out of his way. He knew that the puppy was in danger and since he was the one who’d seen him abandoned, he was the one who had to do something to help him. If it had not been that man who
had seen the pup be abandoned, would the pup still be alive? Would other drivers simply driven past, not willing to take responsibility?
In life, sometimes God uses us to find the lost. We are in the right place at the right time, seeing events unfold. Our faith tells us that charity must guide our actions and if there is something we can do to help another in need, we should act. What is it like to cooperate with God’s grace to
find the lost? What is it like when God finds us? Whom has He used in our lives to reach us? Let us pray for the grace to see, with the eyes of faith, the opportunities He gives us each day to act in charity towards those in need.