Friday of the Twenty-Second Week in Ordinary Time

The image of the new wine and the new cloak help us understand the difference between grace and the law.  It is tempting to to oppose the two and say that the goal of grace and the goal of the law are two completely different things.  Jesus speaks to this temptation when He says that not one iota of the law will pass away until all things are fulfilled.  The more insidious temptation however is to attempt to return to the law after beginning the life of grace.  Baptism is the new garment we’ve been given – we shouldn’t use baptism as a patch that simply covers the hole in the cloak of the old man and the old law.  Very concretely this means that we will rip and shred our lives apart at the core of our soul if we try to use the grace of Christ to give some appearance of perfection to others, to ourselves, or to God.  Grace is not given to us so that we can simply do a better job of obeying the ten commandments – Grace is not a patch for our moral life.  The grace of Christ is given to us so that we become intimately involved with the persons of the Trinity.  Whoever insists that the major goal of Christianity and criteria to judge Christian life has to do with righteousness and moral purity is nothing more than a modern pharisee.  They rip and shred themselves and others to pieces because Jesus becomes simply an enforcer of the Old Law instead of the Savior and giver of a New Law.

The Old Law cannot contain the power and dynamism of life that the New Law of grace brings.  We can’t put this New wine of the Spirit into the old familiar categories of simply behaving correctly and avoiding sin.  If we try to force the new wine into these old wineskins of our soul, it will burst and lose the wine it contained.  This new wine takes us beyond ourselves, and the constant preoccupation of right and wrong in our lives and in the lives of others.  Jesus has saved us from that way of living, He has freed us so that we can live in communion with one another and with the Father.  By obeying His new commandment, He accomplishes the Law in us. (Rom. 6)

ORIGEN:

There is a big difference between being a servant of Christ and a steward of the mysteries of God. Anyone who has read the Bible can be a servant of Christ, but to be a steward of the mysteries one must plumb their depths. Paul was acting as a steward of the mysteries when he commissioned Luke, for example, to write his Gospel, and when he sent Timothy to sort out the Ephesian church. I would even dare to say that in Corinth Paul acted like a servant of Christ, whereas in Ephesus he became a steward of the mysteries of God.¹

CHRYSOSTOM:

Paul honors the Corinthians by calling them servants and makes this even more precise when he adds the term stewards. For we should not give the mysteries of God indiscriminately to everyone, but only to those to whom they are due and to whom it is right that we should minister.²

CHRYSOSTOM:

A steward’s duty is to administer well the things that have been entrusted to him. The things of the master’s are not the stewards but the reverse—what is his really belongs to his master.³

IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH:

Through the wrongdoings of others I become a better disciple, but I am not thereby acquitted.⁴

ORIGEN:

Paul knew that even if his heart was still prone to sin, his deeds were upright.⁵

CHRYSOSTOM:

Paul may have committed certain sins without knowing that they are sins. His purpose here is not to say that he is blameless but to stop the mouths of those who were blaming him unreasonably. God is our judge, because only he knows for sure what is going on in our hearts.⁶

THEODORET OF CYR:

If I am unable to judge myself, how shall I presume to judge others?⁷

AMBROSIASTER:

God will judge in his own good time. A judge is insulted if a servant presumes to pronounce a verdict before the judge makes the decision known.⁸

CHRYSOSTOM:

Paul is not talking here about those sins that we all recognize and confess as such. Rather he is speaking about preferring one person before another and making invidious comparisons of moral behaviors. Only God, who knows all our secret doings, can judge that sort of thing with accuracy. Only he knows what is more and what is less worthy of punishment.⁹

AMBROSE:

“But the days will come when the Bridegroom shall be taken from them.” Which are these days in which Christ is taken from us, especially when he himself has said, “I shall be with you, even to the end of the world,” when he has said, “I will not leave you orphans”? For it is certain that if he were to leave us, we could not be saved. None can take Christ from you, unless you take yourself away. Your boasting will not take you away, nor arrogance, nor may you presume on the law for yourself. “For he came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” … The righteous are those who do not strike him who strikes them, who love their enemy. If we do not endure thus, the opposite is found. “I came not to call the righteous.” Christ does not call those who say they are righteous, for not knowing God and seeking to establish their own righteousness, they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. Therefore the usurpers of righteousness are not called to grace. For if grace comes from penitence, surely one who scorns penitence renounces grace. Those who make themselves out to be holy will be wounded. The Bridegroom is taken from them. Neither Caiaphas nor Pilate took Christ from us. We cannot fast, because we have Christ, and we feast on the body and blood of Christ. For how does he who does not hunger seem to fast? How does he who does not thirst seem to fast? Then, how can he who drinks Christ thirst when he himself said, “Whosoever shall drink of the water that I will give him shall be thirsty no more”? Then what follows will declare the saying to concern the fasting of the spirit.¹⁰

AMBROSE:

The inner man, which is reborn, should not have the varied appearance of old and new actions but be the same color as Christ. With zeal of mind, it should imitate him for whom he was cleansed by baptism. So let the discolored coverings of the mind, which are displeasing to the Bridegroom, be absent, for one who has not a wedding garment is displeasing to him. What can please the Bridegroom, except peace of spirit, purity of heart and clarity of mind?¹¹

CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA:

Those who live according to the law cannot receive the institutions of Christ. These institutions cannot be admitted into the hearts of such as have not as yet received the renewing by the Holy Spirit. The Lord shows this by saying that a tattered patch cannot be put upon a new garment, nor can old skins hold new wine. The first covenant has grown old, nor was it free from fault. Those, therefore, who adhere to it and keep at heart the antiquated commandment have no share in the new order of things in Christ. In him all things are become new, but their mind being decayed, they have no harmony or point of mutual agreement with the ministers of the new covenant.¹²

1. COMMENTARY ON 1 CORINTHIANS 2.18.10–16.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (p. 37). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
2. Homilies on the Epistles of Paul to the Corinthians 10.5.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (p. 38). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
3. Homilies on the Epistles of Paul to the Corinthians 10.5.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (p. 38). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
4. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS 5.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (p. 38). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
5. COMMENTARY ON 1 CORINTHIANS 2.18.49–51.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (p. 38). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
6. Homilies on the Epistles of Paul to the Corinthians 9.3.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (pp. 38–39). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
7. COMMENTARY ON THE FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS 187.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (p. 39). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
8. COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (p. 39). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
9. Homilies on the Epistles of Paul to the Corinthians 9.3.  Bray, G. L. (Ed.). (1999). 1–2 Corinthians (p. 39). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
10. EXPOSITION OF THE GOSPEL OF LUKE 5.20–22.  Just, A. A. (Ed.). (2005). Luke (pp. 96–97). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
11. EXPOSITION OF THE GOSPEL OF LUKE 5.23.  Just, A. A. (Ed.). (2005). Luke (p. 97). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
12. COMMENTARY ON LUKE, HOMILIES 21–22.  Just, A. A. (Ed.). (2005). Luke (p. 97). Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.