Fr Paul Gooley reads from the Gospel of Luke (17: 26-37) in which Jesus says, ‘Whoever tries to keep their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life will preserve it’.

Yesterday’s gospel gave us the description of when the kingdom of God was to come, it was ‘among you’ or ‘within you’, and Jesus warned his disciples about what to do when false alarms about the coming of the Son of Man happened..

Now in this gospel we hear the description of what will happen when the Son of man comes, that glorious and triumphant figure prophesied by Daniel 7.13, to whom will be given all power and authority. Luke is using the conventional terms of Jewish apocalyptic writing of the final cataclysmic event which will bring all things into line with God’s plan for the world.

Jesus warns us to be ready and not to try to salvage property or even one’s own life. Perhaps the grimmest of all is the final comment of the scavenging birds picking over the bodily remains.

In closing Fr Paul asks, When the Son of Man comes, am I ready?