Do Not Forget the Works of the Lord

Homily for Friday of the 1st Week in Ordinary Time

This morning, I’m going to do something I don’t normally do in a homily – preach on the Responsorial Psalm. The Psalmist tells us, “Do not forget the works of the Lord.”

The temptation for all of us, especially over the last several months – and even in just the last two weeks with all that has happened in this country that we love so dearly – the temptation is to get caught up in all the things that have gone wrong.

We can look at COVID and what has happened as a result of the pandemic and question whether or not the Lord has totally abandoned us and forsaken us. We can look at our current political situation and think that evil is prevailing in so many different ways…and has been for years now. We can look at our own lives, consider all the people that we have lost recently and wonder why God has taken such good people from us. We can become so focused on the mistakes and the failures we have made and think that we’ve messed up so much that there’s no hope for us, that we’re too far gone for the Lord to love us. And yet, the Lord reminds us through the words of this psalm: “Do not forget the works of the Lord.”

I really encourage all of us, throughout the next few days, to really, truly look back over the last year…but look at it with a fresh perspective. Think back over each month and ask where the Lord was in it. He was there in some way. If we can’t see it, then we need to ask Him for the grace to be able to see it.

The Lord is at work every second of every day. He is present in the good things and in the not-so-good things. He is with us in our triumphs and He is with us in our defeats. We just have to take the time to recognize it. Because when we see where He was, only then can we truly understand why we’ve gone through the things we’ve gone through. Only then can we know where He might be when we experience something similar in the future. So, let’s heed the words of the Psalmist today. Let’s not forget the works of the Lord. Instead, let’s recognize where He has been and give Him thanks.