All our joys come from the Lord. This is how we too must praise God. This is too how we must thank God. This is too how we must trust God. The relationship that Tobit and his family have with God is the message that is given to us today to be part of our worship in church and outside it for that matter. All the good things that we experience come from God. 

The sufferings that we sometimes face make this hard to be remembered. Tobit's joy in his returned sight and in his new daughter-in-law wipe out the times of sightless  suffering. God has scourged him. Jesus too is to be scourged with the torturer's flail. He too suffers to the utmost and seems to lose trust in his Father. Many of the sufferings of mankind are hard to reconcile with our understanding of a  Loving God. Many people are faced with so much suffering that their hearts and minds cannot be raised out of constraints of pain that bind them. Being the Son does not remove the human suffering of Jesus the man. The source of this pain is my sin.

Dear Lord you know that I really do want to be able to praise you with the fervour of your people of old. You know that I cannot keep from sinning in my thoughts and words. Let me not be so immersed in myself that I forget to pray for all the people suffering from the results of Man's injustice. Lord save thy people.