There are three homily notes here scroll down read and pray
Fr Daniel Evbotokhai
ON FULFILLING THE LAW
Eccl. 15:15-20; Psalm 118; 1Corinthians 2:6-10; Matthew 5:17-37
Matthew 5 is divided into nine different parts; two Sundays ago we looked at the first part which dwells on the Sermon on the Mount (The Beatitudes); last Sunday we dwelt on disciples as salt and light of the world. Today we shall be looking at five other parts that expressed the teaching of Christ on certain laws with the goal of becoming true worshipers and not pretenders. Next Sunday we will look at the last part of Matthew chapter 5 (38-48).
Teaching About the Law: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Jesus did not reject the Old Testament of the Jews, but brought it back to its basics: love God and love your neighbor; Jesus’ life perfectly reflects this pattern of love. Again, Jesus fulfilled the law and the Prophets; in Luke 2;21 he was circumcised; in Luke2:22 he was presented in the Temple for purification; in Luke 2:41 he was with his parents in Jerusalem for the festival of Passover; in fact even Paul says of him in 1Cor.15:3-4 that “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures”. Therefore, Christ did not abolish the law and the prophets. We can go all the way to say that Christianity did not come to abolish our laws and cultures just as some would say. Rather it came to sanctify our laws and customs, Christianity brought love into our laws and traditions. Thank God for the missionaries; else the killing of twins and Abinos would have been a subject matter now like the frustrations of widows and polygamy. Making laws is simple, running a country is challenging but blessed are those who fulfill the law of the Lord.
Teaching About Murder and Anger “You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, ‘You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. In Gen 4 even though Cain killed Abel God did not permit anyone to kill Cain. Thus, murder is a serious offence against God. It is the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another. It further includes: Intentional Homicide; Abortion; Indirect Homicide (a sin which brings about the death of another as a result of negligence of one’s duty. Neglect, for example, by a parent toward a child which results in that child’s death); Suicide; Euthanasia (Mercy killing- a false sense of compassion).
On the other hand, slander, ridicule, gossip violates Christ’s teaching by the very fact that they “kill” another’s character and good name. Other violations would be the use of illegal drugs or abuse of drug prescriptions, neglect of one’s health and the likes. Beloved, we are free but we are accountable for our actions (Eccl. ). Christian maturity is responsibility in freedom. Again, Christ adds “…whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment.” We must learn to work on our temperament. Anger begets insult; hatred; hate and rash speeches.
Teaching About Adultery: ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you, everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Lust is a symptom of adultery or fornication, anyone who has a symptom and does not treat it will soon be in critical condition. Heb 13:4 says Let marriage be held in honor by all, and let the marriage bed be kept undefiled; for God will judge fornicators and adulterers. 1Cor.6:9 the sexually immoral and adulterers will not inherit the Kingdom of God. The cure comes from self-control – ability to cut off lust so that you will not be lost. The Bible says “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away.”
Teaching About Divorce: “It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife must give her a bill of divorce.’ But I say to you, whoever divorces his wife (unless the marriage is unlawful) causes her to commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. Divorce is not a solution to a problem but a change of problem. God does not support divorce. Matt. 19:6 says “they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.” The Angel said to Joseph in a dream “do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit (Matt.1:20). What many have termed divorce are actually unlawful marriages. Unlawful marriage is not even a marriage in the first place. Such a marriage is null and void that is, it has no force, binding power, or validity.
Teaching About Oaths. Again you have heard that it was said to your ancestors, “Do not take a false oath, but make good to the Lord all that you vow. But I say to you, do not swear at all….[…]” This statement is not an absolute rejection of oath. Jesus did not exclude oaths made for grave and right reasons such as ordination and religious profession and marriages. Rather Christ condemns false and frivolous oaths. Don’t take an oath when deep within your heart you know you will not keep it. Eccl5:4-5 When you make a vow to God, do not delay in fulfilling it, because He takes no pleasure in fools. Fulfill your vow. It is better not to vow than to make a vow and not fulfill it. Thus, it says let your ‘Yes’ mean ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No’ mean ‘No.’ Anything more is from the evil one. Beloved in Christ, God is not mocked whatever a man sows he shall reap.
LET US PRAY
O God, who teach us that you abide in hearts that are just and true, grant that we may be so fashioned by your grace as to become a dwelling pleasing to you. Amen.
Fr. Paul Oredipe
The Heart of the Law – INNER COMMITMENT*
with all their hearts – with my heart
The message of today is summed up in the response to the Psalm – “Blessed are those who walk in the law of the Lord.” Previous edition says: “They are happy who follow God’s law.” Following the will of God as expressed in His law is the foundation of our fulfillment and happiness.
But then, how and what does it mean to follow God’s law? The same Psalm gives us the clue. As in previous edition: “They are happy those who do his will, seeking him with all their hearts. … Train me to observe your law, to keep it with my heart.”
The main lesson therefore is “with all their hearts … with all my heart”. What makes our following God’s law meritorious and salvific is only if and especially when we do it with all our hearts. This is the message that Jesus gave us in the Gospel. This is what makes our virtue real and deeper. The heart is the core of the human person. Our acts of worship must be the expression of an interior reality that is profound in nature, a demonstration of fundamental convictions in the deep recesses of the human person’s heart. We are called to a deeper understanding and experience of following God. We need interior conviction and commitment that God’s law is good in itself and deserves to be obeyed because its aim is to ensure our well-being and happiness.
Jesus tells us that mere external observance, exterior compliance and mere conformity to the law, even His law, is not sufficient for a true disciple, for we can sin even if we never commit external act. We can keep the letter of the law and yet fail woefully where the spirit is concerned. We can observe the law externally and violate it internally, thus sinning in thoughts, desires, motives, and attitudes. Sin comes from within our heart, the root of our actions. As it is said: “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” The morality of an act is to be judged more from the interior disposition of the heart than from the external expression of the act. Right behavior must first and above all be a response from the heart to what God is asking of us.
Jesus tells us that He has not come to abolish the law and the prophets, but to fulfill them, to perfect them, to explain them, to spiritualize them, to elevate them, to enlarge them, and to write them in the heart of man by giving grace to fulfill them. God’s laws are expressions of His friendship and of His concern for His people. Jesus fulfilled all of God’s laws perfectly by following His Father’s will, when He sacrificed His very life on the cross for love of God and the human race, a love that sums up all laws and perfects them. Jesus insists on the double commandment of love of God (Deuteronomy 6:5) and of neighbor (Leviticus 19:18), on which “depends all the law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:34-40). Along with the Law, Jesus, the new Moses, imparts knowledge of God’s will to mankind, to the Jews first of all, then to the nations as well (Matthew 28:19-20).
Jesus perfectly fulfills the former Law, and it is thus that He, God become a Man, saves the world! He comes into the world in order to save it, but He does so by perfectly accomplishing the Law of God. He therefore comes in order to accomplish in fullness the sacrifice which was required by the former Law; and, at the moment when He is about to fully sacrifice Himself for His People, He says: “It is accomplished.” (John 19:30) The former Law had its highest expression in ritual sacrifice, and Jesus came to give this former Law its fullness by offering Himself in sacrifice, a sacrifice of love, a sacrifice that demonstrated to all men this Law of love, which then became the new Law!
Jesus did not abolish anything that is true, just, holy pure and lovely. His condemnation of the Pharisees reminds us of that. The Pharisees followed the law and did what they were supposed to do – they paid their debts, observed their religious rituals and were respected leaders in their communities. Yet we hear Jesus telling us: “Unless your holiness surpasses that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of God.”
First of all, the goodness of the Pharisees was superficial; they only kept up appearances. To be sure, they did not commit murder, but their hearts were filled with hatred. So just because we are good on the outside does not necessarily mean that we are good on the inside. We may never commit adultery, but our hearts can be filled with lust. We may never be convicted of theft, but we can rob another person of their value in the eyes of others. We may never murder, but we can blow others away. We may not steal, but we can cheat and thereby take from others what is rightfully theirs.
Evidently being good is not good enough. Jesus expects us to be better than just appear good. Faithful observance of the terms of contract was not what made human beings pleasing to God, but the sacrificial love of God’s Son would place us in a privileged position before God. No amount of legal observance can make up for the absence of love. That is why the terms and components of the new covenant with God will be founded more in the heart than on external observances. Hence, so says the Lord God, “A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will remove from your body the heart of stone, and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezek 36:26).
It was St Augustine who said: “ama et fac quod vis – love and do what you like.” But, as St Augustine went on to explain quite clearly, what he meant was that the law was summed up in charity, and that if we really, perfectly loved God and our neighbour we would be fulfilling the law, not leaving it behind. Love of God and neighbour is the great law from which there is never an exception.
The whole of the law depends on these commandments of love. St Augustine, when he said ‘love and do what you like’, was not presenting us with some comforting, half-baked formula for doing whatever we feel like doing. On the contrary, ‘love and do what you like’ is an invitation and a challenge to enter into a living relationship with the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, a loving relationship which will demand all we have if we are faithful to it.
The truth is that all people, each one of us here, are a strange mixture of good and bad. If we were all totally honest we would have to see that there is some bad in the best of us… and there is some good in the worst of us. We are always a strange mixture of good and bad. Our motives are mixed, too. We hardly ever decide to do anything for one simple and pure reason. Usually we decide to do things for an array of motives that are both good and bad, selfish and unselfish.
Jesus is more in favour of a law of love, rather than a love of law.
The first reading states quite clearly that each person has free will. God does not force His commandments on us, neither is He responsible for the evil which exists in the world. As the reading says in such a thought-provoking and rather frightening way, “Before a man are life and death, good and evil, and whichever he chooses will be given to him.” In other words, everyone decides the way his or her soul shall go.
St Paul, in the second reading, talks about the unparalleled wisdom of God. He says that the weakness and the foolishness of the Cross were the things that God chose for his Son. And even though these things are a greater stumbling block than ever for our present-day culture, the Cross, nevertheless, is the only way to arrive at all that God has prepared for those who love him, what no eye has seen and no ear has heard. God’s claim to obedience, so well exemplified for us in the person of Jesus Christ, is an absolute, total demand, claiming the whole person, not only in outward action but in one’s inner attitudes, in one’s heart. So not only is it wrong to cause bodily injury to another; we must not even harbour evil intent, or anger, or contempt against others.
In the Gospel reading, Jesus proposes a virtue which goes deeper than that of the Scribes and Pharisees, a virtue in depth, from the heart. If our depths are sound, if the heart is good, then the choices which come from the heart will be good. The converse is also true. If we harbour bitterness in our heart towards someone, we will inevitably make choices which damage and hurt them. If we cultivate envy in our heart towards someone, we will tend to make choices which devalue them. Beyond our behaviour lie our choices and beyond them lies the heart in which our choices are rooted. Only the Spirit who reaches the depths of God can really reach our own depths. It is the Spirit who renews and transforms our heart. “God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Rom 5:5.)
By sending the Holy Spirit, God will write the law in the hearts of believers, that is, in the place where personal and responsible decisions are made. Here is that “something more” which will enable us to accept the law not as external command, but rather as an inner voice. If we keep on opening our hearts to the Spirit of God’s love they will be recreated in his love. Then our choices will be rooted in love and will have something of the life-giving quality of Jesus himself.
Jesus’ demands are more radical, his vision sharper and his expectations are greater. He does not, however, want the law to become an end in itself. The law is there to serve the people, to guide and protect them, and it must not be used to control them and to oppress them. Today, as in the gospel, Jesus calls us to a deeper morality and higher righteousness animated by the new evangelical spirit of charity and sincerity, which did not depend on multiplying regulations but on interpreting the Law in terms of love of God and neighbour (22:37-39). He invites us to go beyond legalistic calculation (which seriously affected the Scribes and the Pharisees) and a literal interpretation of rules, into the spirit of the law, to place ourselves on the level of true love, teaching us that minimal obedience is far beneath the dignity of those who love God and neighbor. To strive for less than perfect love is to strive for too little.
Our Baptism, and our Confirmation in Christ, is what allows us to practice in perfection the Law of God, the Law of love which Jesus manifested on the Cross of Calvary, and which He comes to reveal to us at every Eucharistic celebration.
“They are happy those who do his will, seeking him with all their hearts. … Train me to observe your law, to keep it with my heart.”
May the Lord recreate our hearts in His love. Let us pray in the words of the Psalm:
“Deal bountifully with your servant, that I may live and keep your word. Open my eyes, that I may see the wonders of your law. Lord, teach me the way of your statutes, and I will keep them to the end. Grant me insight that I may keep your law, and observe it wholeheartedly.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
Rev. Fr. Evaristus Okeke
“ _Lord, teach me the ways of your command_ ” (Ps.119:33)
*Keep the Commandments for God cares*
One effective way to dissuade children from indulging in a particular act that is wrong, is by punishing anyone who indulges in it. This is a form of negative reinforcement as it will deter the one who has done the wrong, as well as deter others who may be contemplating such act too. The immediate application of commensurate punitive measures helps to yield the desired result of shaping the behaviour of young people. In our spiritual life, things do not work out exactly in this order. As Christians, our lives are to be shaped by the commandments of the one who has given us life and to whom we shall give account of our stewardship. Like rules and regulations in a school/society, the commandments are meant to help us do good and avoid evil. But unlike what is obtainable in a school/society, there seem not be any immediate or obvious punishment from God when we disobey the commandments. It is as if the one who asked us to obey, does not care if we do not obey. This has made many to think that there is no big deal about the commandments.
The readings of today serve as a reminder to us that keeping the commandments is of utmost necessity. God, even when He seem to be silent, is ever concerned about our attitudes towards the commandments. In the first reading, Sirach noted that “the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him, and he knows every deed of man”. This means that God takes note of our deeds and misdeeds. Every sin has its consequence; and when the mind is ever fixed on sinning, we perpetually deprive ourselves of sanctifying Grace. Sirach further mentioned that “the Lord has not commanded anyone to be ungodly, neither has he given anyone permission to sin”. So we dare not say or assume that indulging in sin does not matter.
The attitude of “it does not matter” as regards committing sin, has eaten deep into the mentality and culture of many. It pops up in statements such as “everyone is doing it”; as if God has permitted it. Sadly too, we often time try to make virtue out of sin by the wrong use of the word “Prudence”. Prudence is a virtue that enables us to apply moderation in what we do. Prudence only moderates what ought to be done; it has no business moderating what ought not to be done in the first place. So, there is no prudence in sin; at no frequency does sinning become a virtue. We cannot commit sin, and console ourselves that we are prudent simply because we know of another whom we judge sins more frequently or grievously than we do. The fact is, you will always have excuse for sinning if you have not made up your mind to overcome. If you are looking for a worse sinner than yourself, your senses (including your mind) will always provide you with one or more. This wrong use of “Prudence” that gives some comfort in sin, is what St. Paul in the second reading refers to as the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age. It is a wisdom that is doomed to pass away.
The battle against sinning is a continuous one; but the problem is that many are no longer making genuine effort. The frog wants to remain in the water and pray that water does not enter its mouth. The frog is obviously unserious. There should be no stop to making genuine effort. In the gospel reading, Jesus noted that he has not come to abolish the law and the prophets but to fulfill them. This means that irrespective of what we may think or what may be obtainable around us, obedience to the law of God remains worthwhile. Do not give in to sin because everybody is doing it. Everybody cannot save you. Do not implicitly or explicitly encourage others to sin; though they will be responsible for their wrong deeds, you too will not be spared. No matter how weak or absorbed you are in a sin, continue to preach against it, when you have to. If you are caught/confronted, do not try to legalize it.
The battle against sin is fierce. Jesus acknowledges this fact; and so, in the gospel reading of today, he teaches us to pay attention to every sin at their infancy stage. Sin grows; the higher it grows, the more difficult it is to over it. Little wonder it is said that old habits hardly die. Let us stop giving the devil a ride in our hearts by habouring sin at its infancy stage, thinking that it’s not a big deal. The fact is, when you successfully complete a task, you are automatically enrolled for the next stage. Stop entertaining lust in your hearts, for you will graduate to fornication or adultery someday. Some entertaining envy and jealousy in your heart, for you will not know when you graduate into a wicked and callous person someday. Stop habouring grudges, for it can turn you into a revengeful person anytime soon. Stop spending your money on frivolities, if not, when you have your own family, you may not escape being an irresponsible spouse/parent. Stop feeling better than others, else you may become difficult to live with. Stop paying attention to yourself only, else you will turn into an inconsiderate person someday. Stop trying to please everyone, else you will loose yourself and still not be appreciated for it.
Beloved, if we must continue on the path of holiness, we must willingly suffer some level of deprivation. Jesus says that we should cut off anything that will prevent us from making heaven. Ordinarily, it is almost impossible for a sane person to cut himself or herself. Yet, this is something we must do for our salvation. To cut yourself means to be resolved to struggle against sin even when no one is watching, when everyone is acting otherwise and when no one will praise you. The psalmist says that you are truly blessed, while the gospel acclamation says you are truly wise. The commendation of God is enough motivation to keep overcoming. *God Bless You!*
