When, in the Book of Exodus, God delivers God’s commandments to the people of Israel, it is understood that this list of precepts is meant to be a set of instructions, a kind of guidance for worshipping God. Each commandment calls the people to responsibility to God and to their own people. God is reminding the people that their lives are not lived out for themselves alone, but rather in a context outlined by the Lord, a context of which they must remain aware as they live in community with one another. God’s commandments are the words of everlasting life. All of them listed in Psalm 19 – laws, decrees, precepts, commands, and ordinances – are a revelation from God, meant to guide us, to lead us, and to offer us insights into our human existence. Each is an invitation to take in and internalize God’s instructions, that we might embody them and thus know intimately the fullness of God. For this reason, they are more precious than gold, for they connect us to the God who loves us.
But misunderstandings of the law are always possible. In John’s Gospel, when Jesus overturns the tables of those who sold oxen, sheep and doves, and of the moneychangers, he is making it clear that their practices are incongruous with relationship with God. Doves were all the poor could afford, but what if they could not? Is God meant to be expensive? The temple was supposed to give all people access to God; the vendors, who are in fact following the law, nevertheless stand in the way of that access. Jesus wants them to see that they have made a business out of worship, that they are putting barriers between the people and God. Jesus makes it patently clear that he has come for change, for transformation – he is challenging them all to a renewal, to a deeper realization of God’s love in people’s lives. And this includes a new understanding of temples itself, one that replaces the edifice in Jerusalem with Jesus’ own body: Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.
The people of Corinth are looking for power and wisdom, but Paul tells them, we proclaim Christ crucified, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. We use laws to define our hierarchies and our structures so that they can claim to afford power, but this is foolishness in Paul’s terms. Christ crucified means God offered himself entirely for our sake; raised up in three days, Christ demonstrated that the weakness of God is stronger than human strength. Paul is calling the Corinthians to transformation, to a deeper realization of God’s love in their lives.
If we are to appreciate all that Jesus Christ has done for us, we have to get past our own limited understanding of his ways, for Christ challenges us all to renewal. Every moment is a call to transformation, to conversion, to change, to a deeper awareness of God in our lives and a fuller awareness of the depth of his love for us. We are on our way, but we have not yet arrived. Let us embrace the one commandment, the greatest commandment, the commandment to love, for only love will move us forward on our journey of transformation. Lord, you have the words of everlasting life…
This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com
