Today we get to see a very tender side of Jesus. I’m not sure if you’ve been paying attention to the last several days of the gospel, but he has been healing people right and left! He’s cast out demons and raised people from the dead. People have been healed just in the touching of his garments. The blind can see the deaf can hear. I mean the guy has been super Savior of the month with more miracles than one can count and yet, the Pharisees were still “seeking a sign from him a sign from heaven to test him.” It says that Jesus “sighed from the depth of his spirit” and he asked, “Why does this generation seek a sign?” This is the tenderness of Jesus in my opinion. Have you ever been in a relationship where the other person constantly wants you to “prove” your love for them and nothing seems to satisfy that? Have you ever been told what to get someone on their birthday or for Christmas? Love is freely given and the word “take” is not a part of the equation at all. Gifts are undeserved treasures from the giver to the receiver based on love and kindness and can never be demanded or expected. Demanding a sign from heaven must have truly broken Jesus’ heart especially since his whole life was a sign from heaven. I’m sure we all know what it feels like to be misunderstood, or to have our motives questioned, or to have others jealous of our gifts. It slices into the core of our being and it hurts. When Jesus sighed from the depths of his spirit today, it struck a tender place within me as to how much he truly loves us beyond measure. Only those that we love deeply have the ability to touch the depth of our spirit. Jesus’ love made him sigh. His response to them was that of a dejected lover, “if you can’t see the measure of my love in all that I have showed you already, then you will never see it.” The statement, “no sign will be given to this generation”, did not speak to his revoking his gifts or his generosity, but their inability to receive his gifts or to accept the miraculous that was all around them.
The gospel ends with “he left them, got into the boat again, and went off to the other shore.” Jesus and God will never force themselves onto any of us and while they are constantly showing their presence and their generosity and their love, they will never go where they are not invited. Jesus is constantly pursuing us without force. He is wooing us with all kinds of gifts of mercy and tenderness and compassion and beauty and wonder. We have the free will to receive his gifts of love or to deny them. His deepest desire is that we let him love us and when we refuse that love he sighs from the depth of his spirit. Just because he got into the boat and went off to another shore for a while, doesn’t mean that he won’t come back to our shore over and over again with extravagant signs of his love. He gave his life for ALL, and continues to pursue all. Will we be a generation that will receive his signs of love or will we continue to push him away to the other shore? The tender heart of Jesus sighs for you to let him love you today, and it is well with my soul.
Reading 1 GN 4:1-15, 25
The man had relations with his wife Eve,
and she conceived and bore Cain, saying,
“I have produced a man with the help of the LORD.”
Next she bore his brother Abel.
Abel became a keeper of flocks, and Cain a tiller of the soil.
In the course of time Cain brought an offering to the LORD
from the fruit of the soil,
while Abel, for his part,
brought one of the best firstlings of his flock.
The LORD looked with favor on Abel and his offering,
but on Cain and his offering he did not.
Cain greatly resented this and was crestfallen.
So the LORD said to Cain:
“Why are you so resentful and crestfallen.
If you do well, you can hold up your head;
but if not, sin is a demon lurking at the door:
his urge is toward you, yet you can be his master.”
Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let us go out in the field.”
When they were in the field,
Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.
Then the LORD asked Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”
He answered, “I do not know.
Am I my brother’s keeper?”
The LORD then said: “What have you done!
Listen: your brother’s blood cries out to me from the soil!
Therefore you shall be banned from the soil
that opened its mouth to receive
your brother’s blood from your hand.
If you till the soil, it shall no longer give you its produce.
You shall become a restless wanderer on the earth.”
Cain said to the LORD: “My punishment is too great to bear.
Since you have now banished me from the soil,
and I must avoid your presence
and become a restless wanderer on the earth,
anyone may kill me at sight.”
“Not so!” the LORD said to him.
“If anyone kills Cain, Cain shall be avenged sevenfold.”
So the LORD put a mark on Cain, lest anyone should kill him at sight.
Adam again had relations with his wife,
and she gave birth to a son whom she called Seth.
“God has granted me more offspring in place of Abel,” she said,
“because Cain slew him.”
and she conceived and bore Cain, saying,
“I have produced a man with the help of the LORD.”
Next she bore his brother Abel.
Abel became a keeper of flocks, and Cain a tiller of the soil.
In the course of time Cain brought an offering to the LORD
from the fruit of the soil,
while Abel, for his part,
brought one of the best firstlings of his flock.
The LORD looked with favor on Abel and his offering,
but on Cain and his offering he did not.
Cain greatly resented this and was crestfallen.
So the LORD said to Cain:
“Why are you so resentful and crestfallen.
If you do well, you can hold up your head;
but if not, sin is a demon lurking at the door:
his urge is toward you, yet you can be his master.”
Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let us go out in the field.”
When they were in the field,
Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.
Then the LORD asked Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”
He answered, “I do not know.
Am I my brother’s keeper?”
The LORD then said: “What have you done!
Listen: your brother’s blood cries out to me from the soil!
Therefore you shall be banned from the soil
that opened its mouth to receive
your brother’s blood from your hand.
If you till the soil, it shall no longer give you its produce.
You shall become a restless wanderer on the earth.”
Cain said to the LORD: “My punishment is too great to bear.
Since you have now banished me from the soil,
and I must avoid your presence
and become a restless wanderer on the earth,
anyone may kill me at sight.”
“Not so!” the LORD said to him.
“If anyone kills Cain, Cain shall be avenged sevenfold.”
So the LORD put a mark on Cain, lest anyone should kill him at sight.
Adam again had relations with his wife,
and she gave birth to a son whom she called Seth.
“God has granted me more offspring in place of Abel,” she said,
“because Cain slew him.”
Responsorial Psalm PS 50:1 AND 8, 16BC-17, 20-21
R. (14a) Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.
God the LORD has spoken and summoned the earth,
from the rising of the sun to its setting.
“Not for your sacrifices do I rebuke you,
for your burnt offerings are before me always.”
R. Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.
“Why do you recite my statutes,
and profess my covenant with your mouth
Though you hate discipline
and cast my words behind you?”
R. Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.
“You sit speaking against your brother;
against your mother’s son you spread rumors.
When you do these things, shall I be deaf to it?
Or do you think that I am like yourself?
I will correct you by drawing them up before your eyes.”
R. Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.
God the LORD has spoken and summoned the earth,
from the rising of the sun to its setting.
“Not for your sacrifices do I rebuke you,
for your burnt offerings are before me always.”
R. Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.
“Why do you recite my statutes,
and profess my covenant with your mouth
Though you hate discipline
and cast my words behind you?”
R. Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.
“You sit speaking against your brother;
against your mother’s son you spread rumors.
When you do these things, shall I be deaf to it?
Or do you think that I am like yourself?
I will correct you by drawing them up before your eyes.”
R. Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.
Alleluia JN 14:6
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
I am the way and the truth and the life, says the Lord;
no one comes to the Father except through me.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
I am the way and the truth and the life, says the Lord;
no one comes to the Father except through me.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel MK 8:11-13
The Pharisees came forward and began to argue with Jesus,
seeking from him a sign from heaven to test him.
He sighed from the depth of his spirit and said,
“Why does this generation seek a sign?
Amen, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation.”
Then he left them, got into the boat again,
and went off to the other shore.
seeking from him a sign from heaven to test him.
He sighed from the depth of his spirit and said,
“Why does this generation seek a sign?
Amen, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation.”
Then he left them, got into the boat again,
and went off to the other shore.
if you can’t see the measure of my love in all that I have showed you already, then you will never see it...this struck a nerve, been there, so many times. Thank you Jen! Love u!
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