Solidarity in sin
We are one in our weaknesses, one also in God’s love and in the salvation he offers us in Christ in the solidarity of grace. Sinners and saints, at the same time, the enemy in us and paradise within us, we long to be saved by Christ now, to transcend our doubts, our different forms of selfishness, our sufferings, our divisions within ourselves and our separations from one another. Yet, it is in this kind of life, within this torn human destiny, that Christ will save us, if with him, we accept his life and grace.
In the Gospel, Jesus exhorts his disciples to vigilance. They are like servants who should always be ready for the master’s call.
Reading: Romans 5:12b,17-19,20b-21
There’s no comparison between that death-dealing sin and this generous, life-giving gift. The verdict on that one sin was the death sentence; the verdict on the many sins that followed was this wonderful life sentence. If death got the upper hand through one man’s wrongdoing, can you imagine the breathtaking recovery life makes, sovereign life, in those who grasp with both hands this wildly extravagant life-gift, this grand setting-everything-right, that the one man Jesus Christ provides?
Here it is in a nutshell: Just as one person did it wrong and got us in all this trouble with sin and death, another person did it right and got us out of it. But more than just getting us out of trouble, he got us into life! One man said no to God and put many people in the wrong; one man said yes to God and put many in the right.
All that passing laws against sin did was produce more lawbreakers. But sin didn’t, and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace. When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down. All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that’s the end of it. Grace, because God is putting everything together again through the Messiah, invites us into life—a life that goes on and on, world without end.
Gospel: Luke 12:35-38
“Keep your shirts on; keep the lights on! Be like house servants waiting for their master to come back from his honeymoon, awake and ready to open the door when he arrives and knocks. Lucky the servants whom the master finds on watch! He’ll put on an apron, sit them at the table, and serve them a meal, sharing his wedding feast with them. It doesn’t matter what time of the night he arrives; they’re awake—and so blessed!
Prayer
Lord our God,
we experience every day that we are
a melting pot, at times a boiling pot,
of courage and cowardice,
of questions, hesitations, vulnerability,
of selfishness and generosity, of sin and grace.
God, grant that we may accept
our solidarity in sin,
to share the better our solidarity in salvation,
which comes to us through your Son,
Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.