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Tuesday, Second Week of Lent B (March 2/2021)
Your Daily Blessing: May the Lord protect you from vainglory and grant you the grace of compassion. Amen!
NARRATION: A certain politician gave me scholarship in 1983 based on the fact that I had one of the best WAEC results the previous year but indigent (with nobody to pay for my university education). So I was excited about the scholarship.
Unfortunately, when on 31st December, 1983 the military took over government after a coup, the scholarship died with it because it meant the end of political privileges. The politician didn’t consider what his scholarship meant to me beyond his politics.
Meanwhile, I had to resign my job at the Federal Ministry of Commerce and Tourism in a bid to take up the scholarship. But then, not only did I not get the scholarship, but it also cost me my job! The politician did not have a clue what that simple act did to a poor African boy.
That was the case then, that is still the case today. They have no clue what the average person suffers as a consequence of their actions. Does that describe you? If yes, you still have a slim chance to change from your ways.
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In the Gospel today Jesus warns us about doing ‘good deeds’ only to attract attention or praise from people. Such ‘good deeds’ are empty because they don’t go deep; they are products of vainglory.
Many priests lament about people who come to ‘harvest and bazaar’ and buy things running into millions of Naira (local currency); they enjoy the applause of the people, but once they get home, they forget to pay! Vainglory will publicly spray money running into thousands or millions at a given celebration of a friend, but will not give N1 to a poor neighbor whose child dropped out of school.
Prophet Isaiah invites people like this to repentance. He says, “even if your sins are as red as crimson, they will become white as snow….” God is offering us another day on earth to repent of our sins and live a life worthy of our calling – sons and daughters of God.
PRAYER: Merciful Father, vainglory is a natural tendency in us. I want to be praised for everything I do. In fact I do good so as to be praised! Teach me silent giving, for that is the only proof it comes from the heart.
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