Overview:

Wednesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time

A Reflection for Wednesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time

Brothers and sisters,
I could not talk to you as spiritual people,
but as fleshly people, as infants in Christ.
I fed you milk, not solid food,
because you were unable to take it.
Indeed, you are still not able, even now,
for you are still of the flesh.
While there is jealousy and rivalry among you,
are you not of the flesh, and walking
according to the manner of man?
Whenever someone says, “I belong to Paul,” and another,
“I belong to Apollos,” are you not merely men?

What is Apollos, after all, and what is Paul?
Ministers through whom you became believers,
just as the Lord assigned each one.
I planted, Apollos watered, but God caused the growth.
Therefore, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything,
but only God, who causes the growth.
He who plants and he who waters are one,
and each will receive wages in proportion to his labor.
For we are God’s co-workers;
you are God’s field, God’s building. (1 Cor 3:1-9)

Find today’s readings here.

We may sometimes mistake God for a taskmaster: the dean of a school, sternly watching from a distance and waiting to punish us the moment we mess up. Or we might think of him as the CEO of a company: an unreachable figurehead with whom a personal relationship is impossible.

In this reading from Corinthians, Paul makes clear who we are in relation to our creator: “We are God’s co-workers/ you are God’s field, God’s building.”

We exist in partnership with God. After all, God chose to embody himself as a human being: Jesus Christ, who existed among ordinary people, was raised by ordinary people and was ultimately killed by ordinary people. He had friends who adored him but also with whom he had complicated interpersonal relationships. He was seen as an enemy by state and religious authorities, but he asked his father to forgive their errors. He ministered to good men and women but also to those on the outskirts. And he worked with people—as a carpenter, a builder of things, whose creations likely existed in mundane ways in the homes and lives of his neighbors.

Seeing God in this way helps us understand that we are collaborators, not employees. We have agency. In the beginning, Adam and Eve placed us on a path of sin. But that only forces us to constantly work on ourselves, always trying to do better, which is exactly what God wants us to do.

Some prominent people of faith—represented in this passage by Paul and another Judean Christian leader, Apollos—may help us find our way, but they’re only representatives of the faith. All of us are building the Kingdom of Heaven together, starting here on Earth, working together with God. We may be taking different paths, but we are all going to the same kingdom.

God is not your boss. He’s your friend, your supporter, your advocate—the figure in your life that pushes you to do better and be better. He just wants you to succeed.

Kevin Christopher Robles is the studio production associate at America. He was previously an O'Hare Fellow and intern.