Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Jan 14 2025

Blessed Are They Who Walk in the Law of the Lord

We live in a country where we prize our freedom, cling to our right to choose, and even define our homeland as “the land of the free.” Today’s scriptures remind us that along with rights come responsibilities. We are to respond to our God who made us and calls us to be a people of the new covenant, ratified by the saving death of God’s Son on the cross.

“If you choose you can keep the commandments, they will save you,” says Ben Sira (Sirach 15:15). For the Jewish people the law was a blessing and those who chose to keep the law would be blessed with life. That choice is still before us today.

Jesus’ teachings reveal his wisdom in understanding the law of the Mosaic covenant. His grasp of what was at the heart of the law can be clearly found in the long form of today’s Gospel. While there is an option for a shorter version, spend some time with the longer reading (Matthew 5:17–37).

We are to live as kin in what has been called the “kin-dom” of God. In a world that justifies preventative strikes, Jesus forbids not only killing but even getting angry and bearing a grudge. He teaches that reconciliation takes priority over worship, that the prohibition against adultery extends even to looking with lust at another, reducing a person to an object for self-gratification. Finally, he asks us not to swear but to speak with simplicity and integrity.

Some might dismiss all this as impossible to achieve. But, as a young virgin was once told: “[N]othing will be impossible for God” (Luke 1:37).

Consider/Discuss

How does the “law of the Lord” influence my life?
Do I consider God’s law as increasing or limiting my freedom?
Can I accept the “bottom line” that Jesus is asking of his disciples?

Responding to the Word

We can pray for the Holy Spirit to open our minds to understand what is at the heart of Jesus’ teachings, and that we both discern what God asks of us and respond wholeheartedly. Thus we witness to others what it means to walk in the law of the Lord.

Jan 14 2025

Scripture Study for

The legitimacy of the instruction from Sirach is grounded in the theology of retribution, which maintains that wise or righteous living will result in happiness or blessing, and foolish or depraved living will meet with misfortune or punishment. Today’s reading addresses human freedom and human choice. The eyes of God look on the righteous with pleasure, just as the righteous look to God in fidelity. Although it is God’s desire that all will live in conformity to the order established, God has predestined no one to sin or to blessedness. All have been given freedom of choice. It is up to us to use it wisely.

Paul contrasts the wisdom of the gospel with the wisdom of this age. The plan of God was hidden in the past, but is clearly revealed in the present. The mature are those who have entered into the dying and rising of Christ by accepting the wisdom of the gospel. Everything hinges on the essential mystery of the death and resurrection of Christ. Paul maintains that if the rulers of this world had known that the glory of God resided in the man Jesus, they would not have crucified him. However, they should have known, because Jesus did not keep this secret.

Although Jesus’ teaching was based on the common tradition of Israel, his interpretations were so unprecedented that some accused him of having rejected that tradition. Jesus insists that his interpretations really offer the fuller meaning of the tradition. The contrast that Jesus sets up is not between himself and the law, but between his interpretation of the law and that of the scribes and Pharisees. He criticizes them for insisting on the minutiae of the law at the expense of the righteousness that is at its heart. Jesus demands much more than mere external conformity. Whether it is harmony in the community, fidelity in marriage, or faithfulness to one’s word, Jesus calls for radical commitment.

Jan 08 2025

Not a Law-destroyer But a Law-fulfiller

In a world of kings and emperors and governors and rulers, how can someone get access to the “big man at the top?” He has many guards. He lives in a mighty palace. You have to know the right people even to get a glimpse of him. Ordinary folks just cannot get access to the “Boss.”

In the same way, the Israelites revered God, the Holy One, as unapproachable, mighty, pure, and majestic, the “biggest (boss) at the top.” They believed that you would die if you saw God. Their reverence was rich and deep. Even Moses, who was the greatest of prophets, only saw where God had passed by. Thus they wondered, how do we get access to the Divine?

How did they solve that “access” question? If you wanted to get to Jerusalem, you followed the road to Jerusalem. If you wanted to get to the God of purity, you followed the road that led you to become pure, for the Most Holy could not look upon sin. How do you become pure? By following the laws of purity. What we may not understand from our vantage point is that observing the law meant everything to the religious people of Jesus’ day—not for the sake of “the law” itself, but because they wanted to be able to approach God. They wanted to come to God with a clean heart. The law was their way to get access to the Most High God.

Jesus understood that theology. When Jesus said that he didn’t come to destroy the law but to fulfill it, he understood their longing: they wanted access to God. That was admirable. Jesus honored that. Moving forward from the written law, he offered himself as the road to the Father: “I am the way.”

Consider/Discuss

St. Paul got into many arguments about the law. He also understood the theology that following the law granted access to the Father. After his conversion, he understood that Jesus was now the way to the Father. The law may not have passed away, but how often do we try to gain access to God’s favor through adherence to law? What does it mean to you for Jesus to be “the Way”?
Reverence for God seems to be on the wane in our culture. Purity is not reverenced much either. How does that cultural attitude affect your own spiritual and moral life? Where do you hold yourself accountable? Where do you feel that you can let yourself slack off?

Living and Praying with the Word

Jesus, you have promised us that you are the way of access to the Father. We live in that hope. Help us not to be presumptuous about purity, thinking that we can live any way we choose and you will blithely forgive us. Help us to be perfect as you are perfect, pure as you are pure. We cannot do this on our own. We come through you who are the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Lead us to the One who is Unapproachable Radiance!

Jan 08 2025

Scripture Study for

Biblical wisdom literature, as here in Sirach, often talks about the choice between two paths: wisdom or foolishness, life or death. The point of traditional wisdom literature is to make this choice clear and to argue for the way of wisdom and of life. The commands of God are intended also to point toward the way of life. God’s commands are not impossible to fulfill, otherwise they would be unjust. Humans must learn to trust that what God commands is, in fact, the truly good. Sin, in this reading, is failure to trust God and so choose the wrong path.

Although Paul declared that he did not come to the Corinthians speaking wisdom (2:1–5), he now concedes that, in fact, he did come speaking wisdom. But it was not the “wisdom of this age.” Instead, he spoke God’s wisdom, which only those who are “mature” can understand. God’s wisdom is not likely to be persuasive to those who think with the mind of the age rather than with the mind of God (see Romans 12:2). This wisdom is only accessible through the power and gift of the Spirit, who alone comprehends the “mysterious, hidden” plan of God. Paul will go on to insist that it is this same Spirit that the Corinthians have received, so that they may “judge spiritually,” and not according to the wisdom of the world (2:11–15).

Jesus insists to his disciples that he has not come to abrogate a single divine command or prophetic exhortation. Instead, he insists that the law exists not merely to be “observed,” but to be lived. It is intended to point toward and inculcate those dispositions and virtues that together comprise “righteousness.” The way to the kingdom of heaven is not merely to follow the rules, as if they in themselves were the point. Rather it is to become formed into people whose wills reflect the values embodied by the law (which of course does not excuse one from keeping the commandments).

Dec 10 2024

Only God Lasts Forever

The Sermon on the Mount in Matthew gives us the sayings about who is blessed: the poor in spirit, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, etc. Today we get Luke’s version, the Sermon on the Plain, where Jesus adds, “Woe . . . woe . . . woe . . . woe . . . .”

Why does Jesus use the word “woe” more than anyone in the Bible? I had to go look that up. The Greek term for “woe” is an interjection of grief. It sounds like this: ooo-AH-ee: it’s kind of like a moan, a noise that you make when you are in sorrow or distress. My great-grandmother might have moaned “woe” or “alas.” But nowadays? What word do we have? Maybe a deep gut-wrenching “Whoa”? Or “Oh my gosh!” Or “Oh no!” (or less-printable things). Woe is not an expression of condemnation. Jesus is grieving for those who trust in things that don’t last. Those who are full will be hungry again. Those who are well thought of, well, their reputation could crash.

Jesus knows that anything can happen. Woe is not just for “those folks.” A tree can fall on your swing set in the night. A neighbor who was robustly healthy dies suddenly on Tuesday. A friend who is eight months pregnant loses her baby. You’ve seen it. Life is tenuous. We travel a world of woe. Sometimes we mess up. Sometimes it just comes upon us. “Woe” happens.

If this life is all there is, St. Paul tells us today, then we are the greatest of fools, the most pitiable of people. We believe there is more, an eternity that matters.

Things don’t last. God does. That’s what we can rely on. Jesus knows our struggles to trust through the trials and the blessings of life. He moans in grief for us: ooo-AH-ee. Maybe we should take up that cry, too?

Consider/Discuss

It is the middle of February, starvation season in many agrarian cultures, funeral season in many churches. This is a difficult time to hear of “woe.” Yet Jeremiah and the psalmist tell us to plant ourselves securely, like trees by running water, the water of God. How can you plant yourself in the waters of God in your current life situation?
In Greek it is ooo-AH-ee. There doesn’t seem to be a consistent word that we all use in English. What word or expression do you use to release gut-churning unhappiness? What do you say?

Living and Praying with the Word

Jesus, you moan over the sorrows in our world. We moan, too. There is a time for everything—a time to laugh and a time to weep, a time to live and a time to die. You know the vagaries of life. Help us not to grieve you.

In the middle of winter’s barrenness, we rejoice that you have overcome the woes and the difficulties. You have given us your resurrection. Death and pain are not the final answer! Help us to trust in that. Come, Holy Comforter, and groan within us. Then bring us your peace.