Read­ing Time: 2 minutes

Introduction

This Sunday is the pen­ul­tim­ate Sunday of our litur­gic­al year. As the Church year draws to an end, the Gos­pel invites us to con­sider Jesus’ pre­dic­tions and teach­ing about the end of time. In the con­text of the Gos­pel accord­ing to Mark, Jesus addresses his dis­ciples as he pre­pares them for his suf­fer­ing, pas­sion, death and resur­rec­tion. What is the con­text of this Sunday Gos­pel reading?

Signs of the end

“But in those days, after that suf­fer­ing, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be fall­ing from heav­en, and the powers in the heav­ens will be shaken. Then they will see the Son of Man com­ing in clouds with great power and glory. Then he will send out the angels, and gath­er his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heav­en” (Mark 13:24–27). In Mark 13:1–23, Jesus warned and advised his dis­ciples to beware of false christs and false proph­ets who will appear and per­form signs and mir­acles to deceive them. He admon­ished them to.……

The shekinah of God

The Shekh­ina or Shekh­i­nah (Hebrew: šekī­nah) is the Eng­lish trans­lit­er­a­tion of a Hebrew word mean­ing dwell­ing or set­tling. Shekh­i­nah des­ig­nates the dwell­ing or set­tling of the divine pres­ence of God, espe­cially in the Jer­u­s­alem Temple. That is, shekh­i­nah means God’s mani­fes­ted glory or God’s pres­ence. The word shekh­ina is not found in the Bible. How­ever, later Jew­ish schol­ars used it to refer to the dwell­ing or set­tling place of God, espe­cially the Temple in Jer­u­s­alem. This is why the house of God or the house of wor­ship should be treated with utmost respect and regard. In Jew­ish and Chris­ti­an theo­logy, shekh­ina is the glory of the divine pres­ence, con­ven­tion­ally rep­res­en­ted as light or inter­preted symbolically. 

Conclusion

Last Sunday we reflec­ted on Jesus’ obser­va­tion about people’s fin­an­cial con­tri­bu­tions in the temple treas­ury and the example of sac­ri­fi­cial giv­ing that he saw in the poor widow’s offer­ing. A care­ful read­ing of the Gos­pel accord­ing to Mark reveals the fol­low­ing: Jesus’ pre­dic­tion of the destruc­tion of the Temple; his teach­ings about the costs of dis­ciple­ship; the afflic­tions that will accom­pany the end times; and finally, Jesus’ instruc­tions to his dis­ciples about the need for watch­ful­ness so that they will not be caught unpre­pared for the eschat­o­lo­gic­al moment.

FOR DETAILS, GET YOUR OWN COPIES OF THE BOOK “THE WORD OF LIFE: SUNDAY REFLECTIONS” (vols. I and II)!! The reflec­tion for the 33^rd Sunday of the year (B) is found in vol. II pages 517–527. Happy reading!

For details on how to get it, con­tact the author on this link: https://m.me/uchennabiblia?fbclid=IwAR2yeg4a6sDGBp9QGkIvKj6FSADumMokN6lshdE0zuo-JHs6qOmlhA7jyHo or email me at: postmaster@uchennabiblia.com or simply send an SMS on 08116100926, and I will get back to you.

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