Wednesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 433

I fed you milk, not solid food, because you were unable to take it. Indeed, you are still not able, even now, for you are still of the flesh. While there is jealousy and rivalry among you, are you not of the flesh, and walking according to the manner of man? Whenever someone says, “I belong to Paul,” and another, “I belong to Apollos,” are you not merely men?

There are many moments in the life of Christian pastors when they would like to offer “solid food” but their parishioners or patients are not ready to hear of anything unfamiliar to them. They are caught up in their own anxieties, grievances, or suspicions and cannot take an interest in abstruse topics like How to read the Bible or Celebrating the liturgy.

Saint Paul, one of the most brilliant theologians in the history of the church, encountered that frustrating indifference often. When he might have spoken of the cosmic significance of Jesus Christ Crucified and Risen, leading the church in ecstatic praise of God's Benevolent Mercy, he found his people dividing into camps, “I belong to Paul” or “I belong to Apollos!”

They required the pap of babes rather than the food of adults.

However, being a better man than me, he engaged his spiritual infants and drew them into adult considerations. He acknowledged the apostles Apollos and Paul but pointed past them to the God who had sent Apollos and Paul. They were only “ministers through whom you became believers;” but you should understand, “God caused the growth!”

Paul’s genius could embrace the context and people without making of them anything different; and then he could see the Holy Spirit working there. Nothing had to change before the Spirit would move; every moment and circumstance is right for God's grace. 

This is the mystery of Incarnation, that God is invested in our world just as it is; and we can pray, "Just as I am without one plea, but that thy blood was shed for me." 

Although we celebrate the seasons of Lent with penance and Easter with triumphal joy, we don't have to wait for those seasons before we atone for our sins or rejoice in the Lord's victory. 

In fact, we're liable to waste precious opportunities if the Spirit says, "Do this now!" and we object, "It's not the right time." 

I hear people declare they will quit drinking on January 1 or quit smoking on Ash Wednesday. "No you won't;" I say, "every time you repeat a habitual act you reinforce that habit. You'll be no more ready for it then than you were yesterday.

"Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation."

In God's Spirit we develop a sense of God's time and God's place. The right moment might not be the one I preferred; the gospel I wanted to hear might be pap for babies. What I want, think, or need is just not that important. The seed I plant today might germinate next week, or next year, or never. If I want anything I do to be effective, I learn the centurion's way:

For I too am a person subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes; and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”