Page:Ninety-nine homilies of S. Thomas Aquinas upon the epistles and gospels for forty-nine Sundays of the Christian year (IA ninetyninehomili00thom).pdf/29

 "Jesus took bread and brake and gave it to His disciples." S. Bernard, "The good Minister Who gave His Flesh for food, His Blood for drink, and His Soul for a ransom, He will likewise serve in glory." S. Mark xii. 57, " That He will gird Himself and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth to serve them." Rightly, therefore, we are said to be His ministers. But there are these things which He chiefly hates in His ministers want of compassion, disobedience, and uselessness. Of the first, S. Matt, xviii. 32, 33, " O thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me: shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellow- servant, even as I had pity on thee?" S. Matt. xxiv. 48, 49, " But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; and shall begin to smite his fellow-servants, and to eat and drink with the drunken, the lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, and shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Of the second, S. Luke xii. 47, " And that servant which knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes." Of the third, S. Matt. xxv. 30, "And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." There are three things which the Lord requires in His servants the first, that they should be cleansed from every defilement of sin; the second, that they should be ornamented with every virtue; the third, that they should be decorated with honesty of manners. Of the first, Ps. ci. 6, " He that walketh in a perfect way he shall serve Me." 1 Tim. iii. 10 (Vulg.), " Let them minister having no crime." Of the second, 2 Cor. vi. 4, " In all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God." Of the third, 1 Peter ii. 12, " Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles." Of these three things, Exo. xl. 12, 13, " And thou shalt bring Aaron and his sons unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation and wash them with water;" (v. 15), "and thou shalt anoint them as thou didst anoint their father," etc. 2 Cor. ii. 15, " We are unto God a sweet savour of Christ." But the Lord requires that we should serve Him in three ways first, by imitating Him; second, by delighting in His service; thirdly, by fearing Him.