JULY142024

At the end of the gospel of St. Matthew we hear the Great Commission where the Risen Jesus sends out his disciples to teach and to baptize. However, during his public ministry Jesus sent out the disciples with a different mission. They were to drive out “demons.” The demons then were probably the same as the demons today — the demons that make us doubt our worth and value. Some demons: lack of self-worth, poor self-image, sense of shame, feelings of inadequacy, negativity, envy, fear of failure. The gospel reports that the disciples  “anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.” Having a mission to drive out the demons which diminish our belovedness before God just in being who we are seems needed in our world today just as it was for those long ago disciples. As one theologian put it, we’ve been so focused on original sin that we forgot original blessing. St. Paul describes our true condition this way. God has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him. From the first moment of our existence, indeed before we were even born, God has been blessing us. That message of our blessedness is what Jesus wants us to understand.