GUIDED BY CHRIST, WE PUT ON A NEW SELF

XVIII SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME - Ephesians 4:17,20-24

This Sunday’s readings present three main themes, which we must reflect upon.

1. PEOPLE ARE IN DEEP TROUBLE AND THEY COMPLAIN.

They complain, because they are starving, and they do not know anymore what to do. They are in a situation of despair, unable to plan for the future, worried solely about their survival. There is a saying in Portuguese that starvation is a bad counsellor, and it may lead to social unrest and violence. In this case, they blamed their leaders for their lack of foresight and for their irresponsibility: “you have brought us to this wilderness to starve this whole company to death!” (Ex 16:3). They compared their life in slavery to the present status and found it better. For them, freedom with starvation was meaningless. We cannot forget that our physical needs, the ones that lead us in the struggle for survival, are the most basic needs that must be satisfied.

Moses, like many leaders today, did not know what to do. However, God told him to listen to the complaints of the people. In fact, that is God’s attitude towards his people: “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings” (Ex 3:7).

God always allows his children to complain, whenever the suffering crushes them down and leaves them hopeless. In the books of Moses, we see that God only became angry with his people when their complaints became revolt and disobedience and when they turned their backs on him and put their trust in somebody or something else.

The book of Exodus, singing the extraordinary liberation of a small group of people from the might of a powerful nation, is full of extraordinary events and miracles. However, most probably the miracle consisted  in the wisdom of making good use of whatever the environment provides, like the coming of the quails in great quantities and the appearance of what was called manna. The desert dwellers are experts in survival, and Moses had a big experience as a shepherd in the desert.

1. THE BREAD OF LIFE

The Gospel makes us understand that people were unable to understand the signs given by Jesus. Like the people of Israel, they were only concerned with how to fill their bellies; they could not look up to heavenly things, being dominated by earthly concerns. They looked for an easy way out to improve their economic and social situation.

Jesus directed their minds and their hearts to the bread of life, but they could not understand that. When Jesus spoke of the bread of life, they pleaded with him: “Sir, give us this bread always” (Jn 6:34), but their minds remained closed, thinking only of a good life here on earth.

1. AIMLESS KIND OF LIFE

Paul never beats about the bush, but goes straight to the point.To the Ephesians and to us he says: Do not be like the pagans, “living the aimless kind of life” that they live.

Paul was referring to the Graeco-Roman society in which he lived. It was a society with great achievements, but those achievements were obtained upon the blood of countless people. It was a society dominated by violence, where people enjoyed and played with violence. It was a society built upon slavery, in which the State was all powerful, with the lives of the citizens at the mercy of the whims of their rulers. It was a society where the rich and the powerful enjoyed life, spending their time in games, dinners and orgies. Everybody had to fight for life, and the weakest were crushed, thrown away and forgotten. Most of the great people of the past, the ones history talks about, were blood thirsty tyrants.

Looking at that society, Paul saw it as an empty and aimless society, without values and without ideals. It was a rotten society, “corrupt and deluded by its lusts”. “They have lost all sensitivity and have abandoned themselves to licentiousness, greedy to practice every kind of impurity.” (Ep 4:19-22). 

In many aspects, Paul’s critique can be applied to our modern, post-Christian society. People have created idols for themselves, gods made on their own image: Money, profit, wealth, power, lust, self-indulgence, that represent no more than our own inner urgings for self-satisfaction and dominance.

We have lost the sense of family and community. Our society is an individualistic society, which ignores the neighbour and the poor; it is selfish, concerned only with one’s life and well-being. 

We need to change. We must be guided by Christ. He is the teacher, and he is the way, the truth and the life. We must get rid of our old self and put on Christ, becoming a new creation. We must allow ourselves to be transformed by the Holy Spirit and “created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness” (Ep 4:24).