(Ex.19:2-6a; Ps.100:1-3,5; Rom.5:6-11; Mt.9:36-10:8) "I bore you up on eagle wings, and brought you here to myself." As the Lord rescued the Israelites from slavery to the Egyptians and brought them into His presence in the desert of Sinai, so in the same way, in a full manner, "God proves His love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us." God loves us and draws us to Himself. He is "moved with pity" when He sees us "like sheep without a shepherd." And so He sends the Good Shepherd in Jesus His Son; and so Jesus sends out His apostles to us, so that by their hands we might be freed from sin and the grasp of the devil and be reconciled with God through Christ. And once "we have… received reconciliation," the Lord promises us, "If you hearken to my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my special possession, dearer to me than all other people, though all the earth is mine." These words He speaks to His chosen ones are the same Paul declares to the Romans when he says, "If, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, how much more, once reconciled, will we be saved by His life." For saved by the crucifixion of Jesus, "justified by His blood" poured upon us, His life is now with us; and remaining in the way He has set before us, obedient to His command of love… laying down our lives as He has, we indeed become "a kingdom of priests, a holy nation." And this Jesus Himself confirms when He instructs His apostles, "Without cost you have received" – He has saved us through no merit of our own… "without cost you are to give" – all our lives are to be sacrificed for Him and for His holy people. Brothers and sisters, we are "His people, the flock He tends." The Lord first called the sons of Jacob, and so Jesus first sends His apostles to "the lost sheep of the house of Israel," to know the fulfillment of the promise made to them in ancient times. And now the Catholic Church is become the New Jerusalem, the new house in which the Lord does dwell, and all are called by God's love into its secure confines. As He revealed His love when He "gave [the apostles] authority over unclean spirits to drive them out and to cure every disease and every illness," so now the power of God rests upon His Church to draw all men unto the Father by the ministry of His anointed ones. The Lord saves us from all sin; let us come now to be with Him. Written, read & chanted, and produced by James Kurt. Music: "Souls at a Carnival" from All One, sixth album of Songs for Children of Light, by James Kurt. *******