XV SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
BLESSING, ELECTION, REDEMPTION
By our Pastor, Fr. Carmelo Jiménez
The second reading for this Sunday is a profound hymn, not only speaking theologically but it also has literary beauty. It is based on some aspects of God’s plan for salvation: blessing, election, filial adoption, redemption and hope. This letter is attributed to Saint Paul and with these words he synthesizes the entire salvific action of God through his son Jesus Christ. On this reading I will base my reflection, of course without forgetting the gospel.
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ
with every spiritual blessing in the heavens” (Eph. 1:3) With the Incarnation of Jesus Christ every blessing has come to its culmination. Because everything is grace and gratitude to God. The entire plan of salvation starting with the promise made to our first parents comes to fruition in Jesus Christ. This entire plan unfolds from long ago by God who is moved by love of man.
“He chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him. In love” (Eph. 1:4). To be chosen, through all of salvation history, has been the best that God could offer man. Studying the divine attributes, Omnipresence is the fifth essence of God, and his presence is to do good and to save. It is a special strength for the journey of life.
“He destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ, in accord with the favor of his will” (Eph. 1:5). We are adopted as sons and daughters of God the Father only through Christ, with the certain hope of having eternal life with God as our inheritance, in the eternal banquet. What greater grace than to be his own sons and daughters, of the one who made everything and can do anything. We can only become children of God through the goodness and gratuitous love of God.
“In him we have redemption by his blood, the forgiveness of transgressions” (Eph. 1:7). Through Jesus Christ and for the price of Blood, we have been freed of the former curse of condemnation. In the Easter Proclamation we sing: “oh Happy fault that earned so great, so glorious a Redeemer!” This is the decisive proof of the great mercy of God: if he sacrificed his much loved Son to death on the cross, how could he not forgive our sins. I have always affirmed that even if our sins are very ugly and grave in the eyes of God, if we repent and confess them, God forgives us and he returns to us his grace and his friendship, as well as the dignity and divine filiation.
These important aspects of salvation: blessing, election, filial adoption, hope and redemption, these are the aspects that should be announced with the gospel. In the Gospel we hear that Jesus Christ called the ones that He wanted and he sent them two by two. He sent them to bring the liberating word. Evangelization is an urgent task today for every Christian. Evangelization is to bring man to the sphere of integral salvation. This is the good news: the life of men here on earth has profound meaning. To evangelize is to help man learn to be the true image of God destined to live in communion and happiness. And this begins here in this world.
And so every believer is in the world, and share its joys and difficulties of every man, but they live their everyday live with their gaze fixed on the Blessed Lord who has always blessed him. It’s necessary to go back to this experience of blessing to give testimony in the world of the true face of our God and of Jesus. May we be filled with profound love today which comes from God, and knowing that we are blessed, take his love and blessing to all those whom we meet. Amen.