Reflection on Today's Readings, Wednesday of 10th Week of Ordinary Time, Year 1, June 9th, 2021
Texts: 2Cor. 3:4-11; Ps. 99:5-9; Mtt.5:17-19
St. Paul, today, reminds us of our inability to accomplish anything for God without His help. Put differently, whatever our accomplishments might be, it is made possible by God's help. St. Paul puts it thus: _"Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our sufficiency is from God, who has qualified us to be ministers of a new covenant"._ We are not to claim any merit for our achievements in God since it is attained by his sufficient might. By his words, St. Paul impresses on our minds that we are sufficient with God. This calls us to do whatever we have to do in God, for in Him we have sufficient power for success.
St. Paul also reminds us that it is God who qualified us to serve the new covenant. He qualified us by giving us power to keep the terms of the covenant; He endowed us with the qualities needed for the covenant. By this he tells us that we have the grace needed to do the will of God, the grace to keep His law. This is made possible by writing the law in spirit rather than in written code. It is written in spirit because it is inspired by the Spirit of God in us. The same Spirit who inspires it also enables us to keep it. In the letter to the Hebrews, we are told how this occurs: _"how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify your conscience from dead works to serve the living God"_ (9:14). The Spirit applies the Blood of Jesus to purify our consciences to make the law of God clear to us, without ambiguity. This brings about the fulfilment of the prophecy of Jeremiah: _"Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it upon their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people"_ (31:31-33). This tells us that in Jesus Christ the law of God is clear, without ambiguity. The law is not just clear, we are also enabled to keep it. If we find the law of God unbearable, it shows that we are not at one with the Spirit. We have to be at peace with the Spirit to be able to serve the new covenant since He is the one who convinces us about the law and also empowered us to keep it. The Holy Spirit makes the law part and parcel of our lives. By the Spirit we incarnate the law, we make it concrete and our lives show it forth.
The point made by St. Paul is that we are made sufficient to keep the law by God; the sufficiency to keep the law is from God. Jesus Christ tells us in the gospel that He came to obtain for us the sufficiency needed to keep the law. It is said, _"Jesus said to his disciples, 'Do not think that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfil them'"._ He achieved this by purifying our consciences with His Blood through the Spirit.
St. Paul goes further to tell us that the glory we have in the new covenant, written in spirit, is more than that written in letter. He says, _For if there was splendour in the dispensation of condemnation, the dispensation of righteousness must far exceed it in splendour."_ Jesus Christ also affirms this in the gospel reading thus: _"he who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”_ Our glory is in keeping the law of God.
Lord Jesus Christ, we confess our insufficiency before You and ask for your sufficient strength to do Your will; give us Your Spirit that we may have the clear vision of Your law and be empowered to keep it. Amen.
Fr. Andrew Olowomuke
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