The
New Husband
Begin
with prayer to the Holy Spirit
Readings
: Romans
7:1-6, Philippians 3:12-14
St. Paul in our last two chapters discussed how we are united with Christ, and
how we have been made free from sin and death. Paul now begins to explain how
death leads us to true freedom especially in observing of the Law as a means
for salvation. He begins his discussion with those who have an understanding
of the Law. This would be in true Pauline form taking his case to the Jew
first or as he says to those that know the law. "The "law" here
stands for a religious observance as a way of salvation." (Collegiate
Bible Commentary, Pg. 1087) The lesson that is drawn from past
experience is that it is highly impossible to fully satisfy the demands of the
law. The logical out flow of this thought is, if this were possible then we
would not have needed a savior. The law was a guide to the moral and social
ideal of the standards of God. Paul draws our attention to the notion of death
and how it demonstrates the beginning of the new covenant we have with God
through Christ Jesus. Paul begins to explain this by drawing our attention to
the ties one has in marriage according to the law and how these obligations
are terminated in death.
The termination of obligation that is realized in death for a marriage stated
by the law is applicable to the termination that baptism portrays in Paul's
discussion of this subject in chapter six. Therefore Paul is saying to his
audience that your baptism whether it is something you have already observed
as a new believer or something you have yet to complete unites you to Christ's
death. In this unity to Christ death we have been made free from all other
means of salvation apart from Christ. This would include the law as a means
for salvation, or any other standard of holiness or religious observance that
lays claim to salvation. In Paul's use of the holy state of matrimony as an
example for this new relationship one might be reminded of the idea of Christ
being the husband and the church as the bride. Which also brings into focus
the leaving of one and the cleaving to the other and the two becoming one.
When one looks at our relationship with Christ from this perspective it
diminishes any loss we may have incurred to become a follower of Christ
Jesus.
Sometimes in our service to Christ we think about what we could have done if
we were not committed to the values of our Lord and our church. Perhaps you
may feel like your missing something or gave up something to serve Christ,
wishing you could have some of what you feel you have lost or given up.
The focus is not on what we gave up or resisted and shunned. The focus is on
what we died to, and mostly, of what we now have and will gain in the future.
Serving Christ in the newness of the spirit as Paul says is the pinnacle of
success which leaves no room for regret. Perhaps this is why we need to look
closely into the eyes of our Savior who has given so much to those who have
deserved much less. "Not that I have already obtained this or am
already perfect; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has
made me His own. Brethren, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but
one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies
ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in
Christ Jesus." (Phil. 3:12-14) Let us press on like so many others who
have gone on before us and who are now walking along side of us, for we are
not alone.
Quotation
for Meditation
Paul
homes in on the crucial issue between him and Peter in Antioch:(Gal. 2:11-21)
what does it mean, in practical terms, to be a member of God's people? What
does it mean to be a Jew lies behind the argument: 'if you,' Paul says to
Peter, 'though you are a Jew, live in a Gentile fashion rather than a Jewish
fashion, how can you force Gentiles to Judaize?' Peter, by separating
himself from the uncircumcised believers, is implying that if they want to
belong to God's people they must take on themselves the identity of ethnic
Jews by getting circumcised. There Then follows the first ever statement of
Paul's doctrine of justification by faith, and despite the shrill chorus of
detractors, it here obviously refers to the way in which God's people have
been redefined. 'We', affirms Paul, 'are by birth Jews, not "gentile
sinners"; yet we know that one is not justified by works of Torah, but
through the faithfulness of Jesus the Messiah; thus we too have believed in
the Messiah, Jesus, so
that we might be justified by the faithfulness of the Messiah and not by works
of Torah,
because through works of Torah no flesh will be justified.' Paul's
Justification by faith is in reference to the faithfulness of the Messiah to
the plan of salvation for Israel.
N.T.
Wright, Paul, Fortress Press, Minneapolis, Pg.111
Quiet
Time and Then Discussion
Questions
for Meditation
1. Discuss
how death brings about freedom.
2. What
religious observance as in the case of the law can give an individual
salvation?
3. What
is so important that it can not be given to Christ?
Prayer
Lord
Jesus Christ, listen to the voice of our distress in the desert of penitents
crying out to you; that we may not be deceived by the falsehood of discussions
in nobility of birth, from superstition of religion, from curiosity of
knowledge tempting us; grant us to prepare the way to you by abandoning sin,
by the purpose of repenting, by the remission of wrongs, by contempt of
temporal [things], and by the observing of the commandments. May your paths be
made straight in us by the renunciation of our own will, feeling,
self-confidence, by the spreading over and above of counsels/deliberations;
that in the house of Bethany of obedience baptized with the water of true
contrition, with the Holy Spirit and with fire across the Jordan, and after
the river of the last judgment we may perfectly know you, the Mediator of
virtue and knowledge, the Mediator of God and men.
Saint
Albert the Great (1206-1280)
Fr.
Benedict J Groeschel, C.F. R., Praying To Our Lord Jesus Christ, Ignatius
Press, San Francisco, Pg.74