Year I Monday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time

Readings: 2 Corinthians 6:1-10; Psalm 98:1-4; Matthew 5:38-42

In our reading from Saint Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians, in a passage anyone interested in ministry should study, the apostle uses his own experience in ministry to show his brothers and sisters how not to receive God’s grace in vain. He exhorts them and us to follow the teachings of the Lord set forth in our Gospel regardless of circumstances.

One thing Paul is clear about: this is not easy. A Christian follows Christ, according to the apostle:

by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness,
in the Holy Spirit, in unfeigned love, in truthful speech,
in the power of God;
with weapons of righteousness at the right and at the left
through glory and dishonor, insult and praise

If we remain content to live by the lex talionis, which requires an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, then we are no different than the pagans who surround us now as they did the Christians of ancient Corinth. Living differently, even weirdly, by adhering to the Lord’s teaching come what may is precisely how the Lord’s salvation is made known.

In our Gospel, which comes from the heart of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is not speaking elliptically, parabolically, hyperbolically, or figuratively. Rather speaks plainly and unequivocally. The way of the Gospel is the path of maximum resistance as it pertains to our natural and socially reinforced tendencies. The lex talonis seems to be the human default setting.

Endeavoring to become like our Lord is how we receive God’s grace in earnest. What the Lord calls His followers to in this passage is radical trust in and total dependence on God, on God’s provision and God’s justice. Jesus doesn’t just tell us; He shows us by walking His talk.

Too often in the aftermath of some bad experience at the hands of another, I hear something that starts like, “I’m a Christian, but…” This disjunction is usually followed by an intention to do something not in line with the hard teachings of Jesus. Yet, we often persist in justifying ourselves.

Don’t receive God’s grace vain. The Lord perhaps provokes us as much as He consoles us. Take heart. A provocation, by definition, is something for your calling. You are called to eternal life.