Page:Ninety-nine homilies of S. Thomas Aquinas upon the epistles and gospels for forty-nine Sundays of the Christian year (IA ninetyninehomili00thom).pdf/28



IN the preceding Epistle the Apostle has taught us that Christ was a Minister for us. " But I say that Christ was the Minister of the Circumcision," so, therefore, in this Epistle he teaches us that we ought to be the ministers of Christ, and six matters are treated of concerning this ministry. First, that we ought to make ministers of Christ; second, that we ought to avoid a thoughtless choice; third, to despise human discernment; fourth, not to trust to individual conscience; fifth, to submit all choice to Christ as the Judge; sixth, to seek praises from God alone. Of the first, " Let a man so account of us as of the ministers of Christ;" of the second, "to judge nothing before the time;" of the third, that "it is a very small thing to me that I should be judged of you;" of the fourth, " I know nothing by myself;" of the fifth, " until the Lord come;" of the sixth, " then shall every man have praise of God." It ought to be known about the first point that there are three chief reasons why we ought to be ministers of Christ and to serve Him - (1) Because whatever we are able to do He gave us the power to do when He created us; (2) because He served us by redeeming us; (3) because He will further preserve us to glory. Of the first, S. Bernard, "Who ought we more rightly to serve than Him Who need not have created us unless He willed." "It is He that hath made us" ( Ps. xcv. 7 ). Of the second, S. Luke xxii. 27, "I am among you as He that serveth," for He temporally served them by washing their feet, in cleansing by His own blood the wounds of sinners, and in ministering to His own flesh - (1) S. John xiii. 5, " And began to wash the disciples' feet." (2) Rev. i. 5, " Him that loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood." Isa. xliii. 24, " Thou hast made me to serve with thy sins." (3) S. Matt. xxvi. 26,