Wednesday, June 25, 2014

The Feast of St. Peter and St. Paul - 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 17-18

James Brown - "the hardest working man in show business"
1 Timothy 4:6-8, 17-18
I imagine we would all like to make this claim when the time of our departure is at hand. “I have fought the good fight…” In the end that simply means to finish the race with faith regardless of the difficulties faced, the struggles endured or the trials withstood. In his letter to Ephesians Paul will say it this way. “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power… and having done everything, to stand firm.” (Ephesians 6:10, 13) It was in weakness that Paul found strength and in foolishness, wisdom. (1 Corinthians 1:26ff) so that his boasting was in the Lord (even if there was a time or three when his pride got the better of him). But that is what makes him a real person for us and not some mythological Herculean figure. A human being like you and me who did not understand his own actions, lamenting the good that he did not do and deploring the evil he repeated. (Romans 6:15ff) That being said the Paul who penned the 13th chapter of his first letter to the conflicted Corinthians understood the heart of the faith he kept was the unconditional love that had transformed the chief persecutor of the church into the James Brown of the apostles.(1 Corinthians 15:9-10)

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