16th Sunday Ordinary Time, cycle A.

Các Trưởng và Thiếu Nhi Thân mến,

There are three parables that Jesus is talking about in the gospel today. Even though they are all different, they have one main theme that is The Kingdom of God. What is the kingdom of God? The answer to this question is what we are about to learn. Jesus compares the kingdom of God to a sower, who sows wheat in his field, and then weeds appeared and the weeds and the wheats grew together. The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, which was sowed in the field and became a tree. The kingdom of God is like yeast that is mixed in the flour until all of it is leavened. Each parable has a significant meaning about the kingdom of God. But in all of these three parables, there is one common thing that tells us about the kingdom of God. That it is transforming. The transformation of a weed, wheat, mustard seed and yeast must happen before bearing any result. The weeds and the wheat are sowing in the ground. Their seeds have to go through the transformation of themselves. They die and turn into big plants, and a wait their judgement. In the same way with the mustard seed, from a small seed where sown in the ground, is transformed and becomes a great tree that the birds come and make nests in its branches. And yeast mixed with flour till they are all become leavened, gives rise to abundant bread. The message behind this transforming is that in order to enter the Kingdom of God, one must goes through a transformation of oneself, either through sufferings, hardships, or even death. In other words, there is not an easy way for us to come to the kingdom of God. We have to pass these tests in our daily lives. This is an important message for us to learn and to remember as we are living in the world today. Our task for us to reflect on this week is to answer these questions: what are our attitudes in dealing with our difficulties or challenges that we are facing in our daily lives? What do we say or do when we have asked to be true to ourselves and to be faithful to the word of God? May our Lord bless each one of us as we begin our new week. and May each one of our deeds in this week will be a transformation of ourselves that assistant us to the Kingdom of God. Amen.