How the outside shapes the inside: Homily for Thursday, September 28, 2023

How the outside shapes the inside Transcript We don't always think, I think, as much, maybe as we should, about the importance of having buildings and places to worship God and to do the holy things of God.  Think of the difference that, for instance, the school building we're in makes. It shapes and forms us in terms of our lives and in our school, in our community. In fact, we're even looking at how it is that we can best use this facility for the future moving forward.  And that's really what's happening in this reading that's being recounted by the prophet Haggai. They've been in exile, they've been in Babylon, and God has used King Cyrus to allow them to go back, but not only to allow them to go back, to rebuild the temple that was destroyed.  It's a sign that if they turn their lives to God on the outside, they will in fact be converted on the inside. And that's really always the dynamic of our faith. How is it that we can exercise the desire to want to know to get to God better, but How do we allow that knowledge, that way of seeking for God, to really touch our hearts, to really change the way we see the world, the way we think about others, the things that we choose to do and how we choose to spend our time?  Let us ask the Lord today to help us to allow our internal selves to be so changed that we might be mistaken for the Lord Jesus himself.