November 5, 2024 Daily Dose of Discernment

“Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.” (Lk 13:3)

"At my signal, unleash hell" ordered the Roman General Maximus Decimus Meridius in the opening scene of the movie Gladiator. His soldiers did and decimated the greatly outnumbered and outgunned army of Germania in a nightmarish massacre.

When some reported to Jesus that Pontius Pilate executed some Galilean zealots, His response was an admonition, that unless they repent, they would also perish. He wasn't talking about an afterlife torment, but an unnecessary consequence they could avoid right now in this life so that they won’t suffer the same fate. That is, by turning away from their angry and violent thirst for enemy blood and embracing His way of peace. They didn’t listen, and four decades later, their calamity came upon them. The Roman legions catapulted car-sized boulders on the poor Jews and levelled their city to the ground, not leaving one stone upon another, as they turned Jerusalem into a real and present hell.

The warning is real - he who lives by the sword dies by the sword. But the meek and the peacemakers will be blessed and inherit the kingdom of God. Let us follow Jesus as He guides our feet into the way of peace.