Abraham is in a difficult situation in our first reading. Sarah didn’t trust that God would give her children, and she had told Abraham to father a child with his servant, Hagar. Ishmael was born. Today we read that Sarah does conceive and gives birth to Isaac, finally having trusted in God’s promise to multiply Abraham’s descendants through her. But she is still jealous of Hagar, even though she was the one who encouraged her motherhood. She has Hagar sent away, and though Abraham is conflicted, God encourages him that she and Ishmael will be taken care of.
This problem is largely Sarah’s doing, but God encourages Abraham to submit to her wishes. He tells Abraham to let Hagar and Ishmael go, and Hagar despairs of her son’s life. Just when she thinks she can’t bear it any longer, God appears to her and tells her to keep going because He has provided for them, and she sees water.
A similar situation happens in the Gospel reading, only we come in at a different point in the process. After Jesus sends the demons into the pigs, they run into the water and drown. Now the swineherd is left without pigs and needs to replenish his livestock or find a new profession. Maybe this is why he warned the Gadarenes, or maybe it was for some other reason. Regardless, the townspeople are sufficiently upset that they drive Jesus out of town, despite His healing of the demoniacs.
In the first reading, God permits Hagar and Ishmael to struggle even to the point that they think that they will die. In the Gospel, God allows the swineherd to lose his pigs, and he presumably does not have another way to immediately make a living. This leaves Hagar in despair and Ishmael in distress, and it leaves the swineherd concerned enough to encourage the people to drive Jesus out.
In both cases, God never abandoned those He apparently deserted. God either permitted or caused the issues that these people went through, but He explicitly promised that He would look out for Hagar and Ishmael. We can assume that He was also looking out for the Gadarenes. To them, it looked as if they had been abandoned, or at the very least that they had been seriously inconvenienced. To God, all was well.
This is important to keep in mind as we encounter our own inconveniences, troubles, and devastations. God is with us in all of them, and He may even be leading us into them to give us something. Just because we don’t know why He does what He does doesn’t mean that He does it without reason. God knows what He is doing, and His ways are greater than our perception of them. In His estimation, which is the only one that really matters, these things may not be issues at all. Accepted from His hand, directly or indirectly, these trials are turned to glory.
Daily Reading
Tuesday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Reading I Genesis 32:23-33 In the course of the night, Jacob arose, took his two wives, with the two maidservants and his eleven children, and crossed the ford of the…
Saint of the Day
Sts. Aquila and Priscilla
Sts. Aquila and Priscilla
Feast date: Jul 08
Saints Aquila and Priscilla were a Jewish couple from Rome who had been exiled to Corinth, and were friends of St. Paul in the first century. They hosted St. Paul on his visit to that city and were probably converted by him. They are mentioned a few times in the New Testament in glowing terms by their friend Paul, who calls them “my helpers in Christ, who have for my life laid down their own necks” (Romans 16:3-4).They were tentmakers, thus sharing the same profession as Paul, and because of this it is thought that Paul may have worked with them. Acts 18:18-19 tells us that they accompanied Paul to Ephesus and stayed there with him for three years.In the era of house churches – when Mass was always celebrated in the house of one of the Christian community – their house was an important one.According to tradition they were martyred in Rome on their return, probably around the same time as St. Paul.