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Reflection on Gal 5:13-14
Post date: 2019-06-15Autor: BCP
The Apostle says that the whole law is fulfilled in one word: You shall love your neighbour as yourself. Let us bear it in mind and put it into practice. To love my neighbour means to sacrifice myself for him, to desire his salvation, to try to communicate to him the divine truth of salvation, and to lead him to conversion and to the receiving of the Holy Spirit, so that he may live and walk in the Holy Spirit just as I try to do so – this is true love.
Reflection on Jam 2:21-22
Post date: 2019-06-01Autor: BCP
Not only Abraham, Moses, David and all the prophets but above all the Virgin Mary is an example of the obedience of faith for us. Jesus gave her to us as our Mother at the hour of death. We ask: Why? A Czech proverb says: Like mother like daughter. Unfortunately, our natural mother is Eve. We all have inherited the programme of sin from her. We revolve around our ego, which leads us into suffering, problems, and ultimately into eternal death. That is why we must be born again of the Spirit of God. We must receive Christ. But we also need educators, teachers – and who is the best teacher for children in life? Who else than their mother? If a mother is good, then her children are good too. If a mother is bad, then her children are bad too. A mother brings up her children both by word and example. Let us look at the Mother of Jesus. She was preserved from original sin, i.e. spiritual poison, which was passed on to us through Eve, our common earthly mother. However, Mary not only was preserved by God but she also cooperated with grace and acted in faith.
Reflection on Gal 5:17-18
Post date: 2019-05-18Autor: BCP
If we are led by the Spirit of God, the law can no longer judge us because the Spirit of God does not lead us into sin. On the contrary, He gives us the strength to fight, and when we fall He gives us the strength to repent and rise at once and to continue our fight rather than to be plunged in despair or in the spirit of betrayal of our soul and of Jesus who redeemed us by paying the price of His life.
Reflection on 1Cor 11:31-32
Post date: 2019-05-04Autor: BCP
The First Epistle to the Corinthians says that if we judge ourselves, we will not be judged. However, with this judgment, this true self-criticism, we cannot stop halfway. Judas judged himself but ended up committing suicide in despair. True judgment of myself must be connected with the faith that Jesus Christ paid for my sins. So I give my sins to Him and have them covered under His blood. Then it is true: “If we walk in the light, the blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin.”
Reflection on Rom 7:16-17
Post date: 2019-04-20Autor: BCP
Therefore, we have to fight with sin, and not forget the words of Christ: “Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Me.” “Because narrow is the way which leads to eternal life.” (Mt 7:14)
Reflection on Rom 7:14-15
Post date: 2019-04-06Autor: BCP
The Apostle Paul shows here a contradiction, a kind of spiritual schizophrenia, which is caused by original sin in us. The law of God is holy but every one of us is subject to carnality and mentality, and both the body and soul are influenced by the law of sin. Our spirit thirsts for God but is bound and imprisoned by our corrupt nature. Everyone can see by experience that the law of sin is at work in us. This is proved by the fact that we want to do good and we love good but we do evil which we hate and do not want to do. There is a law of sin here. Law is a principle which repeats itself; it is not something that happens just once. The law of sin is at work while we live this life in time. This is what we must reckon with and what the Word of God tells us about. Therefore we need to walk by faith. For there is not only the law of sin but also the law of the Spirit – which will be mentioned in the next verses – and the latter is at work if in concrete situations we unite ourselves to our Saviour, Jesus Christ.
Additional explanation for the preceding Word of life (Romans 7:5-6)
Post date: 2019-04-06Autor: BCP
The reality is that even if we have been converted and try to follow Christ, the power of original sin, which is in us, is still at work. Its source is deep in our soul. We should bury it into the death of Christ, paralyze it by faith. It means that at a particular moment we surrender ourselves, or our will, wholly to God and unite ourselves by faith to Christ crucified. At that moment the source of evil is paralyzed and we cannot sin. But because our life continues in time, after some time we are faced with a test again. We are influenced by the world, the devil and the source of evil – our corrupt nature. They want to deceive us again to make us believe in lies, lose contact with Jesus and begin to do good on our own, without God.
Reflection on Rom 7:5-6
Post date: 2019-03-23Autor: BCP
The passions, which are produced by sin in us, bear fruit to death. Union with Christ’s death makes us able to serve God, i.e. commit ourselves wholly to God, in the newness of life. The Spirit of God, who participated in the resurrection of Christ, then works in us, so that this new life in us may grow.
Reflection on Rom 7:4
Post date: 2019-03-09Autor: BCP
In the previous verses 1-3, we find a picture of a wife and two husbands. The first husband represents the law of God, which is just and perfect. The other husband represents Christ. So long as the woman is joined to the first husband, there are always demands made on her, but the perfect husband, the law, never lifts a little finger to help her carry them out. She desires to marry the other husband, but she cannot be freed from the first one. And because he refuses to die, the only way out for her is to die herself. Next, the verse says that we should bear fruit to God, but the condition is that we should be married to another – to Him who was raised from the dead – Jesus. Then we will bear much fruit. Jesus said: “Without Me you can do nothing.”(Jn 15)
Reflection on Rom 7:3
Post date: 2019-02-23Autor: BCP
God’s purpose in uniting us to Christ was not merely negative; it was gloriously positive – “that you should be joined to another” (Rom 7:4). Death has dissolved the old marriage relationship, so that the woman, driven to despair by the constant demands of her former husband, who never lifted a little finger to help her carry them out, is now set free to marry the other Man, who with every demand He makes becomes in her the power for its fulfillment. And what is the issue of this new union? “That we might bring forth fruit unto God” (Rom 7:4). By the body of Christ that foolish, sinful woman has died, but being united to Him in death she is united to Him in resurrection also, and in the power of resurrection life she brings forth fruit unto God. The risen life of the Lord in her empowers her for all the demands God’s holiness makes upon her. The Law of God is not annulled; it is perfectly fulfilled, for the risen Lord now lives out His life in her, and His life is always well-pleasing to the Father.
Reflection on Rom 7:1-2
Post date: 2019-02-09Autor: BCP
In Romans 6 we saw how God delivered us from sin; in Romans 7 we see how He delivers us from the Law. In chapter 6 we were shown the way of deliverance from sin in the picture of a master and his slave; in chapter 7 we are shown the way of deliverance from the Law in the picture of two husbands and a wife. The relation between sin and the sinner is that of master to slave; the relation between the Law and the sinner is that of husband to wife.
Reflection on Rom 6:23
Post date: 2019-01-26Autor: BCP
The root of sin in us bears poisoned fruits which are harmful both to us and others and set us against God. The verdict is final – death. We need to be aware of it. That’s the reality. There is only one way out – only in time; on the day of God’s judgment there will be no more chance of salvation, for the time of test and trial, which is our life, will have ended. Therefore we have to know and bear in mind that the solution – salvation from eternal death – is only in Jesus who is the Son of God and became man just for our sake, to deliver us from sin.
Reflection on Rom 6:22
Post date: 2019-01-12Autor: BCP
The condition for being set free from sin is to become slaves of God. Chapter six of the Epistle to the Romans very often uses the term “slave”. On the one hand, there is a reality of slavery to sin. Even if we want to get out of this slavery by our own efforts, we cannot. We can be set free from this kind of slavery neither by our own efforts nor by any other means but only by the power of God, and we receive this power under one condition – that we give ourselves wholly to God. It means that we accept His commandments and are guided by the Spirit of God, and no longer by the spirit of the world, the spirit of lies. This freedom, however, has one basic condition – we must lose our soul for Christ’s sake and the Gospel’s (Mk 8:35).
Reflection on Rom 6:19
Post date: 2018-12-29Autor: BCP
This verse expresses again what this chapter has already said before, namely that we should not present our members as slaves of uncleanness, or of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness. On the contrary, we should now put our members fully at the disposal, i.e. present them as slaves, of righteousness for holiness. The Apostle indicates here that sin particularly exploits uncleanness and lawlessness. Therefore we have to stand firmly on the side of righteousness. There are as it were two banners here – the banner of slavery to evil against the banner of true freedom. In this battle, we have to learn the art of fighting. Above all, we should avoid the near occasion of sin, which is a sign of true humility and wisdom.
Reflection on Rom 6:17-18
Post date: 2018-12-15Autor: BCP
Thanks be to God that, being converted, we were given the grace to receive the salvific teaching based on the faith in our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We have been delivered by Him from enslavement caused by sin, and we have taken the new path of righteousness.
Reflection on Rom 6:16
Post date: 2018-11-30Autor: BCP
This verse from the Scripture reveals a deep truth about obedience the fruit of which is eternal life in heaven or eternal death in hell. If we do not serve God wholeheartedly, we are not free but we are slaves of original sin which is in us. We automatically obey original sin, i.e. the source of lies and evil in our heart. Original sin clouds our mind and weakens our will so that we hate the truth about ourselves, reject the true good and refuse to serve God and keep His commandments.
Reflection on Rom 6:13
Post date: 2018-11-17Autor: BCP
“...do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin…”. What does it mean? It calls for steps of practical faith and following Christ. Everyone can gain personal experience from this faith. Naturally, it involves a struggle, a kind of transformation or gradual spiritual operation – we should no longer present our members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin. On the contrary, we should present our members as instruments of righteousness to God.
Reflection on Rom 6:11
Post date: 2018-11-03Autor: BCP
This verse from chapter six of the Epistle to the Romans again is a mystery. The condition for its revelation is a living faith and walking by faith, in other words putting the truth of faith into practice. We can see that the most important thing for us to reckon with spiritual laws by faith is our union with the Lord Jesus Christ, because these laws work in Him alone. In His death on the cross and in His glorious resurrection is the victory over sin. That is why it is important for us to have a personal relationship to Christ crucified and risen. Through baptism we were immersed in Christ’s death and resurrection, and we should live these truths by faith within the framework of time: in Christ Jesus we are dead to sin and alive to God!
Reflection on Rom 6:7-8
Post date: 2018-10-20Autor: BCP
What is the meaning of the words “he who has died has been justified (freed) from sin”? In this context, it does not mean dying physically but dying spiritually to the power of sin which dominates man. Thus, he who has died spiritually with Christ has been justified and at the same time freed from the bondage of sin.
Reflection on Col 3:1-3
Post date: 2018-10-06Autor: BCP
The Scripture verses contain a call: “Seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God.” The literal translation is: “seek intensively the realities which come from above”. And we read further that we are to set our minds on them rather than on the deceit of the world. Naturally, we need to think about things on the earth when seeking and doing the will of God. However, we should not think about them in the spirit of the world but from the perspective of eternity, and that’s a big difference. Things should serve us, and not vice versa. We should serve God, and therefore we have to set our minds on things above.