Have you ever been frustrated with another person? I can imagine God’s frustration with people whom he rescued from slavery and, yet they refuse to listen to his messengers. The prophet today says God realized finally that it didn’t work. The covenant of old was written on stone, like stony hearts! The law for the people was an exterior work, something outside of oneself. Something new was needed. “I will place my law within them and write it upon their hearts.” Yet has it worked any better? Do we not still do the wrong and sin. Yet even with our sins, God bas said, “for I will forgive their evildoing and remember their sin no more.”
ln the Psalm we ask, “Create a clean heart in me, O God.” Do we mean it? Are we ready to let go of our sins and vices? I have heard some today say, “This is who I am. Live with it!” Such is self-centered ego and saying such to God is not part of what asking forgiveness is all about. We think we are Good just the way we are and should be above suffering.
Yet Paul points out that Jesus, “learned obedience from what he suffered!” Ouch! What a way to learn a lesson! As we prepare ourselves during Lent to be obedient to God’s will, let us recognize that our sufferings are nothing compared to Jesus’.
Countenance of God 