Physician for the sick world

The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Wednesday, Feast of St. Luke, Evangelist, 18 October 2023
2 Timothy 4:10-17   <*[[[[>< + ><]]]]*>   Luke 10:1-9

Merciful Father,
thank you for sending us
St. Luke the Evangelist
whose feast we celebrate today:
a physician,
an artist,
and a disciple of your Son
Jesus Christ.

"The Lord appointed seventy-two disciples 
whom he sent ahead of him in pairs
to every town and place
he intended to visit"
(Luke 10:1).

Regardless of our state
in life, we, too, like St. Luke
are called to preach 
and write the gospel of 
Jesus Christ with our 
lives,
with our silent witnessing
of his glory and humility,
kindness and firmness,
art and humanity,
intimacy in prayer
and most especially,
special concern for
women and children
until now so abused in
in so many homes
and in every nation.

Help us, dear Jesus, 
to be like St. Luke, 
a physician
for this world so sick
with wars and other
inhumanity to one another
perhaps due to our lack of
genuine love and respect
for women; what a joy to
read and pray St. Luke's
gospel account teeming 
from the very start with those
wondrous stories of Mary
and Elizabeth who brought
us into the New Testament
with their sons!

Help us imitate St. Luke
as a true physician
who accompanied
until the end his mentor
St. Paul the Apostle:

"Beloved:  Demas, enamored 
with the present world,
deserted me and went to Thessalonica,
Crescens to Galatia,
and Titus to Dalmatia.
Luke is the only one with me"
(2Timothy 4:10).

O God,
how painful to think
everybody is saying that
the world population has to be controlled
when so many among us everywhere
are suffering alone,
dying alone? 

Let us realize like St. Luke 
Jesus Christ's declaration that
"The harvest is abundant but the 
laborers are few" (Lk. 10:2)
that we may go too to your abundant
harvest to heal and console,
comfort and assure the many people
in pain and suffering.
Amen.

St. Luke,
Pray for us!