Living
St Martin Of Tours
RENDER YOUR LOVE AND SERVICE TO GOD
Romans 16:3-9,16,22-27
Luke 16:9-15
No servant can serve two masters,” Jesus told his disciples. “He will either hate one and love the other or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” The word mammon, from the Aramaic, means money or possessions. Jesus personifies mammon here to expose its demonic, slavish grip on us. In fact, disordered material desires become like a demon that controls us. Therefore, those who want to merit eternal life must prepare and live good lives.
Martin was a soldier but gave of his cloak to a beggar. Living a good life involves charity, sacrifices, and perseverance. It involves being persecuted for doing the right thing. To be oppose to the world negative trends.The attractions of this material world constantly present itself giving us the impression as access to our happiness. We pursue it even at the cost of our honor and dignity and after we are caught up with it we find out its disillusion. We end up still looking for that fleeting joy and satisfaction in life.
Sometimes, we equate our joy and satisfaction with the material things of this world. The psalmist says, in his riches man lack wisdom he is like a beast destroyed. True joy, satisfaction and peace of mind can only be found in God. What are you willing to give up so that you’ll find God? Abiding in God is our ultimate purpose, our goal. Taking a page from Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas would refer to God as the highest and eternal Good. Let us
love God, and serve Him in this world so that at the end of our lives here on earth, we will abide in the joyful eternal presence of God forever.
Fr Joseph Osho
