"If you would hearken to my commandments, your prosperity would be like a river, and your vindication like the waves of the sea; Your descendants would be like the sand, and those born of your stock like its grains." Is 48:18
Rivers are fascinating bodies of water. Some flow fast and hard. Others meander through fields slowly and methodically. Isaiah knows this and uses the river as a way to speak of God's graciousness. Whether with fierce power or gentle kindness, God will reward those who live the spirit of the law. More, God will grow the righteous like the sands of the sea and spread their glory over the entire earth.
Faithfulness, the most basic way God tells who God is, is the great challenge of the Gospel. We must be faithful, not only to God, but to all God's people, and fidelity is not simply a function or series of actions, but a way of life, an attitude.
St Lucy, about whom we know very little, was faithful. Despite the rejection she felt from her friends because of her faith in Jesus, she never turned away from her Savior, and when she refused the sexual advances of a man who thought of her as an object of his desire, not a person or a believer, her fate was sealed. Disingenuously accusing Lucy of being a Christian, a charge that led to her martyrdom, her "suitor" assured her salvation. Lucy, whose name means light, continues to challenge us to fidelity no matter the cost.
Today, be faithful to someone who you dislike for the sake of the Gospel.
Who most challenges you with his or her fidelity to God despite the consequences?
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