The second reading for the Twentieth Sunday in ordinary time continues with Ephesians, chapter 5:15-20, and the exhortation for holy living. The NAB translates the first phrase in v.15 as “watch carefully how you live,” which the NRSV translates “be careful then how you live.” I like the translation of the NAB because of the focus on “watchfulness.” One of the most difficult aspects of living life for me is living life with watchfulness. It is easy to fall into patterns, to live life by rote, to find a comfort zone where watchfulness just drifts away, even if that comfort zone is filled with unreflective busyness. How I live is not always based on conscious decisions, which is precisely the issue. You begin to do things because that is the way you have always done them, or you simply plop on the couch after a busy day, unable to consider what would be the best way to live.

Watchfulness or carefulness in life, the letter to the Ephesians says, is choosing wisdom over foolishness, understanding over ignorance. In some ways, this strikes me as even more difficult to do today than in the past because of the cacophony of voices and options, in terms of politics, education, entertainment, the media, and so on. So many of the options and voices, though, become noise, a sort of background drone, from which we desire to escape. This is why, it seems to me, it is so important to be clear about first principles as followers of Jesus. Though the rush of everyday life is like a veritable tug to make more and more decisions without thinking, we have to pull back from the fray and determine what is important in how we live. An increased focus on watchfulness in our lives should slow us down.

The NRSV says to make “the most of the time” (the NAB has, “make the most of the opportunity”) and contrasts drunkenness, a thing of the flesh, in Pauline terms, with singing hymns to God, a thing of the Spirit. Perhaps in contradiction to most of the messages we receive today, “making the most of the time,” is not a call to increase productivity or activity, but a call to think about the things of God, to reflect on our lives and our choices and to take time to make these decisions with watchfulness and care, as Ephesians 5:20 says, “giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

 

John W. Martens is an associate professor of theology at the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minn,where he teaches early Christianity and Judaism. He also directs the Master of Arts in Theology program at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity. He was born in Vancouver, B.C. into a Mennonite family that had decided to confront modernity in an urban setting. His post-secondary education began at Tabor College, Hillsboro, Kansas, came to an abrupt stop, then started again at Vancouver Community College, where his interest in Judaism and Christianity in the earliest centuries emerged. He then studied at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto, and McMaster University, with stops at University of Haifa and University of Tubingen. His writing often explores the intersection of Jewish, Christian and Greco-Roman culture and belief, such as in "let the little children come to me: Children and Childhood in Early Christianity" (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2009), but he is not beyond jumping into the intersection of modernity and ancient religion, as in "The End of the World: The Apocalyptic Imagination in Film and Television" (Winnipeg: J. Gordon Shillingford Press, 2003). He blogs at  www.biblejunkies.com and at www.americamagazine.org for "The Good Word." You can follow him on Twitter @biblejunkies, where he would be excited to welcome you to his random and obscure interests, which range from the Vancouver Canucks and Minnesota Timberwolves, to his dog, and 70s punk, pop and rock. When he can, he brings students to Greece, Turkey and Rome to explore the artifacts and landscape of the ancient world. He lives in St. Paul with his wife and has two sons. He is certain that the world will not end until the Vancouver Canucks have won the Stanley Cup, as evidence has emerged from the Revelation of John, 1 Enoch, 2 Baruch, and 4 Ezra which all point in this direction.