LIVE IT TODAY: Saturday, February 21, 2026
Follow Me without delay—leave what binds you, and I will heal what is broken within you.
LIVE IT TODAY: Saturday, February 21, 2026
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GOD’S DECLARATION TO YOU TODAY
Follow Me without delay—leave what binds you, and I will heal what is broken within you.
INVOCATION
Come, Holy Spirit! Through the intercession of Our Blessed Mother Mary, open my heart to hear and receive all that You desire for me. Draw me ever more deeply into the Love and Life of the Blessed Trinity!
GOSPEL | Luke 5:27-32
Jesus saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at the customs post.
He said to him, “Follow me.”
And leaving everything behind, he got up and followed him.
Then Levi gave a great banquet for him in his house,
and a large crowd of tax collectors
and others were at table with them.
The Pharisees and their scribes complained to his disciples, saying,
“Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”
Jesus said to them in reply,
“Those who are healthy do not need a physician, but the sick do.
I have not come to call the righteous to repentance but sinners.”
EVERY DAY QUESTION
What struck you? Challenged you? Inspired you? What questions did it raise?
GOING DEEPER
Grace interrupts ordinary life and invites immediate response.
Levi is sitting at the customs post, embedded in a system of compromise and profit. Tax collectors were not merely disliked; they were seen as collaborators and betrayers. Yet Jesus sees him. Not his category. Not his reputation. Him.
“Follow me.” Two words. No lecture. No preconditions. The Greek implies decisive action—Levi rises and leaves everything behind. Conversion is not theoretical. It moves the body. It reorders priorities.
Levi’s response is joyful. He throws a banquet. The house once marked by compromise becomes a place of encounter. Grace does not merely remove sin; it transforms space. His friends—other tax collectors and sinners—are brought into the orbit of mercy.
The Pharisees grumble. Their question reveals their logic: proximity equals endorsement. But Jesus answers with clarity. He is a physician. A doctor’s presence among the sick is not contamination; it is mission.
This Gospel speaks powerfully to the domestic church. Parents are called not only to personal conversion, but to make the home a place where others encounter Christ. Hospitality becomes evangelization. Repentance becomes contagious.
Conversion is not a private upgrade; it is a communal invitation. When a mother or father rises from old habits and follows Christ sincerely, the whole household feels the shift.
Build saint-forming homes by responding promptly to Christ’s call, pray over your children by name that they may recognize and answer His voice without hesitation, and act boldly in the power of the Holy Spirit, turning your home into a banquet table where sinners meet the Divine Physician.
“Jesus invites sinners to the table of the kingdom: ‘I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.’” (CCC 545)
LIFE APPLICATION QUESTIONS
In My Heart: What is Jesus asking me to leave behind in order to follow Him more fully?
In My Home: How can our home become a place of welcome and healing rather than judgment?
In My World: Who might Christ be asking me to invite into deeper encounter with Him?
FAMILY LIVE IT
Make some time today to gather together and, going around, share one way you feel Jesus inviting you to grow or change.
Then pray together aloud. As parents, place a hand on each person and pray over them by name, asking that they know God’s love personally, be freed from the Enemy’s lies of shame or complacency, be strengthened to overcome temptation, and be filled with courage to follow Christ immediately and joyfully.
Daily Challenge: Extend a simple act of hospitality or encouragement to someone who may feel distant from God.
DAILY PARENT & GRANDPARENT BLESSING
LORD JESUS CHRIST, let Your holy anointing be upon each of our children, grandchildren, and godchildren this day and week, including all to whom they are called in vocation, and all future generations! In Your Sacred Name we claim them for You! We renounce all whispers, lies, and influences of the Enemy! We pray right now that each know Your loving Presence, be forged in virtue, and be flooded with an abundance of Your Holy Spirit to live fully their identity and mission in You now and through all eternity, through the intercession of our Blessed Mother! Amen.
PARENT BLESSING PROJECT: bit.ly/ParentBlessing
GOING VERTICAL
“Be still and know that I am God.” Psalm 46:10
Just as the vertical beam upholds the horizontal beam of the Cross, so too does undistracted, dedicated daily turning to God as our lifeblood uphold and strengthen every part of life. Start with just three minutes. Wait patiently for the breakthrough beyond the noise. Let Him speak.
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WE WANT TO PRAY FOR YOU!
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What struck me today about the Matthew call story, when coupled with the Isaiah reading, is how the Lord works in the world through INDIVIDUALS, and through individual conversion leading to individual and group(of individuals) action. "If YOU do x, y, and z," says God through Isaiah, "YOUR light will dawn in THE darkness."
THE DARKNESS DOES NOT VANISH; my light shines IN the darkness. The hungry do not vanish (after all, everyone is hungry, at least three times a day); I will feed them, etc.
Elsewhere, Jesus reminds the disciples that "The poor will be with you always." (i.e. You will always have something to do for me).
And consider how the call of Matthew reflects the ancient wisdom of Isaiah: Jesus calls HIM, MATTHEW. One individual man. Jesus does not set out to reform the entire Roman taxation system, or even advocate it. He calls MATTHEW, and that night he dines at MATTHEW's with other tax collectors, suggesting the way MATTHEW's light will illuminate the way for other individual tax collectors whose light may also dawn in the (ongoing) darkness. Still, at the dinner, there is no "social justice" goal, no attempting to eliminate darkness as a feature of the world.
Isaiah's language calls it THE darkness, not "darkness" as an abstract idea. THE darkness implies permanence. The righteous person does not take on the impossible task of eliminating THE darkness, he operates IN it.
God's word in Isaiah also compares the righteous PERSON with "a spring" or an oasis. Let's take clear note that a spring is an individual POINT of water in a desert or wilderness, like the individual righteous man in the dark world. The desert remains; the spring draws the thirsty TO IT, and there they find nourishment. The spring or oasis obviously cannot water the entire desert, nor does it need to. Animals and seeds of plants will be drawn to the oasis and there be nourished. They will thrive in spite of the seemingly lifeless desert all around.
For those who spend their days campaigning for "social justice," for a structural end to the "desert" of an unjust world, but who neglect to feed their own neighbors, woe. Not only will they be disillusioned and perhaps even despair, but surrounding them will be unsatisfied affliction, hunger, and thirst, in which no one will see the attractive light, the "spring" of their individual love and care.
As the song goes, "Let it begin with ME."