From: Matthew 16:24-28
Jesus Foretells His Passion and Resurrection (Continuation)
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Commentary:
24. “Divine love, ‘poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit who has been given to
us’ (Romans 5:5), enables lay people to express concretely in their lives the spirit
of the Beatitudes. Following Jesus in His poverty, they feel no depression in want,
no pride in plenty; imitating the humble Christ, they are not greedy for vain show
(cf. Galatians 5:26). They strive to please God rather than men, always ready to
abandon everything for Christ (cf. Luke 14:26) and even to endure persecution in
the cause of right (cf. Matthew 5:10), having in mind the Lord’s saying: ‘If any
man wants to come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and fol-
low Me’” (Matthew 16:24) (”Apostolicam Actuositatem”, 4).
25. A Christian cannot ignore these words of Jesus. He has to risk, to gamble,
this present life in order to attain eternal life: “How little a life is to offer to God!”
(St. J. Escriva, “The Way”, 420).
Our Lord’s requirement means that we must renounce our own will in order to
identify with the will of God and so to ensure that, as St. John of the Cross com-
ments, we do not follow the way of those many people who “would have God will
that which they themselves will, and are fretful at having to will that which He wills,
and find it repugnant to accommodate their will to that of God. Hence it happens
to them that oftentimes they think that that wherein they find not their own will
and pleasure is not the will of God; and that, on the other hand, when they them-
selves find satisfaction, God is satisfied. Thus they measure God by themselves
and not themselves by God” (”Dark Night of the Soul”, Book 1, Chapter 7, 3).
26-27. Christ’s words are crystal-clear: every person has to bear in mind the Last
Judgment. Salvation, in other words, is something radically personal: “He will
repay every man for what he has done” (verse 27).
Man’s goal does not consist in accumulating worldly goods; these are only means
to an end; man’s last end, his ultimate goal, is God Himself; he possesses God
in advance, as it were, here on earth by means of grace, and possesses him fully
and forever in Heaven. Jesus shows the route to take to reach this destination—
denying oneself (that is, saying no to ease, comfort, selfishness and attachment
to temporal goods) and taking up the cross. For no earthly—impermanent—good
can compare with the soul’s eternal salvation. As St. Thomas expresses it with
theological precision, “the least good of grace is superior to the natural good of
the entire universe” (”Summa Theologiae”, I-II, q. 113, a. 9).
28. Here Jesus is referring not to His Last Coming (which He speaks about in the
preceding verse) but to other events which will occur prior to that and which will
be a sign of His glorification after death. The Coming He speaks of here may refer
firstly to His Resurrection and His appearance thereafter; it could also refer to His
Transfiguration, which is itself a manifestation of His glory. This coming of Christ
in His Kingdom might also be seen in the destruction of Jerusalem—a sign of the
end of the ancient people of Israel as a form of the Kingdom of God and its sub-
stitution by the Church, the new Kingdom.
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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.
Liturgical Colour: Green.
| First reading |
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| Nahum 2:1,3,3:1-3,6-7 © |
| Responsorial Psalm |
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| Deuteronomy 32:35-36,39,41 © |
| Gospel Acclamation | 1S3:9,Jn6:68 |
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| Or | Mt5:10 |
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| Gospel |
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| Matthew 16:24-28 © |