vicariously

Nehemiah 8:2-4, 5-6, 8-10; Ps 19 Your words, Lord, are Spirit and life;  1 corinthians 12:12-30; Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21

Just a few words.

Right smack in the middle of the second reading, as St. Paul unfolds his understanding of church we get these words addressed to one of the earliest christian communities and for that matter addressed to us:  "You are Christ's body, and individually parts of it."

You are Christ's body....

Lets rearrange it a bit and see if we can drive home the point St. Paul is making.  You are the body of Christ.

There that's better.  Think in that.  You are the body of Christ.

We see parents all the time wanting to live vicariously through their children.  We especially see this in the sports world.

But want St. Paul is telling us is that Christ not only wants to but does in fact live through us.  Our body, our flesh and blood and bone now become his body.

Wow!

St. Luke tells us in the gospel that "many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the vents that have been fulfilled among us, just as those who were eyewitnesses from the beginning and ministers of the word have handed them down to us, I too have decided, after investigating everything accurately anew, to write it down orderly that you may realize the certainty of the teachings you have received."

St. Luke has picked up his pen to write the story of Christ.  He has chosen to do so for posterity sake, for the future.

St. Paul invites us todo the same.  When he tells us that we are the body of Christ, then he simply reminds us that the story of salvation, the story of God's intervention into history is no longer that which is kept on a written page but rather now is proclaimed through flesh and blood.

We now tell the story of Christ by the life we live.  It is our lives now that become the medium of execution to keep the story alive and to spread it forth into the future.

This is our task.  We pick up where St. Luke leaves off.  We must become story tellers with the life we live.  This is the most essential way of making sure that the story is not only told but truly is reliable and believable because it is witnessed in our life.