Our Lady of Carter Lake Catholic Church at 3501 N. 9th Street, Carter Lake, IA 51510 US - A New Vision and Direction

Seventh Sunday of the Year 1Samuel 26:2,7-9,12-13,22-23 1Corinthians 15:45-49 Luke 6:27-38 The Rev. Richard Wurmbrand was born a Jew in Rumania, became a Christian, switched to atheistic Communism and finally was ordained a Lutheran minister. When Stalin's forces took over Rumania, Richard Wurmbrand was arrested for publicly defending the Christian faith and put in prison for fourteen years. Because he continued to talk about Christ to the prisoners, the Communists tortured him with spiked closets, ice treatments, starving rats and hot irons. Yet, Wurmbrand would always emerge and say, “Before I was interrupted, I was telling you about Christ.” His full story is told in a book entitled Tortured for Christ. Before the Stalin takeover, the Nazis had their Jewish holocaust in Rumania. In talking with a Nazi soldier, Richard Wurmbrand learned that this was the very man who had killed his Jewish wife Sabrina’s entire family. Sabrina was now a Christian. This Nazi did not believe in either guilt or forgiveness. So Richard brought his wife Sabrina to this man and told her what he had done to her family. Sabrina embraced the Nazi, kissed him and said: “As God forgives you, I forgive you.” Sabrina Wurmbrand could do what seems impossible to us, because she believed in Christ’s words in today’s gospel: “Love your enemies and do good to those who hate you. Be compassionate as your Father is compassionate. Forgive, and you will be forgiven.” The Interpreter’s Bible acknowledges the difficulty of feeling any kind of love toward someone who has hurt us deeply. But it insists that even though “to love is not necessarily to like,” we should still want for someone “the best in life that God can help us make available for him or her.” In other words, Jesus is not asking for nice feelings, which we cannot control. He is asking us to want nothing but the highest good for someone. Sabrina Wurmbrand understood this. Her husband was unfaithful to her at one time. Although she condemned his infidelity, she would not condemn him. The Nazi soldier had killed her parents, three brothers and two sisters. To his utter amazement, Sabrina did not demand revenge. Instead she disarmed him with forgiveness. Sabrina wanted nothing but the best for her husband Richard and for the soldier – their reconciliation and healing, a new vision and direction, and a place in God’s kingdom. We see David doing the same thing for Saul in the first reading. Saul had tried several times to kill David. Yet, when David had a chance to kill Saul in his sleep, he spared his life. By contrast, how many times have we figuratively put the sword to someone who injured us, either by making a snide remark or by leaving them in the lurch or by giving them the cold shoulder? Obviously, Christ isn't saying that we should give away our second family car to some thief who has just made off with the first car. But he is saying that we should love those who hurt us in some way, at least by willing their highest good; that we should take some initiative to reach out in forgiveness, instead of seeking revenge. We don't have to feel like doing it, but we do have to have faith in it. The paradox is that by doing good to others, it will come back to us in surprising ways. By giving only what will help someone, God's graces will be given to us in good measure.

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