Our first reading this weekend is again taken from St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans. In the portion we hear, Paul is considering Israel’s failure to accept Christ from the standpoint of God: it does not mean that God’s promises have failed, nor that this was not foreseen by Him in His gratuitous election of Israel.
Israel, Paul states, has failed to recognize that uprightness comes through Christ, the END OF THE LAW. He then adds that “The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart” – that is the word of faith in Jesus.
This conveys the major idea that Jesus is God’s revelation to humankind about the way to live. It requires persons to think and behave like Jesus. Instead of trying to keep “a written law,” humans need to try and imitate Jesus. Its all about having a relationship with God.
Our second reading, the Gospel, conveys the story of Jesus expelling demons from two men. It is in the section of Matthew’s Gospel wherein he shares ten miracles of Jesus. In the ancient world, Jewish and Gentile, ailments which exhibited some unusually repulsive features or for which there was no explanation, were often attributed to demons. It is rarely possible to define the ailment that is explained in this way. The important feature of this and other exorcisms Jesus performed is not whether he accepted this common belief. Those who formed the Gospel traditions could not have represented him speaking in terms other than those familiar to the people. The important fact is that the exorcisms show that Jesus liberates men from the fear of demons. Demons have no real power and are instantly subdued by a word from Him. The power of God overcomes any other power. The significance of exorcism is not that the Christian should or should not believe in demons or their power, but that they should, because of their belief in Jesus, treat demonic power as absolutely nonexistent. If we focus our lives on believing and living with Jesus as our Savior and Lord, and embrace His way of living, nothing else matters. We must make Jesus, and His way, the absolute rule of our lives. We must be sure to keep our “eyes fixed on Jesus”, as St. Paul would say.
The message I received from today’s readings is: Keep your life focused on trying to actualize your potential to be more like Jesus.