Thursday after Ash
Wednesday
(Deuteronomy 30:15-20; Luke 9:22-25)
“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,” writes poet Robert
Frost discerning the direction he should take in life. One road, he says, “bent in the undergrowth”
as if it was so well traveled that one might lose oneself on it. He took the other one because, he claims, it
seemed less worn. Is that second trail the
road of life, which Moses exhorts the Israelites to follow in today’s first
reading and which Jesus delineates in the gospel?
Moses also refers to a choice. He exhorts the Israelites to choose wisely in
what may be called a fork in the road ahead.
One prong will lead them to life and prosperity through love of God and
compliance with His commandments. The
other will bring them to dissolution through self-indulgence and
injustice. Jesus explicates what God desires
of humans: that they deny themselves for His sake. He too mentions a choice. One can gain the whole world and be
imprisoned in it. Or she can lose everything
that she has and find herself in the company of Jesus, the resurrected one.
Lent is a period of grace to reflect on the choices which
the readings today propose. We are to
spare ourselves of comfort so that we can focus on Jesus. He gave up everything so that we might choose
life with him.
