Wednesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time
The Incarnation is a central and beautiful mystery of our faith. It is such good news that God so loves us that God became flesh! What more of an affirmation do we need that our flesh is not the enemy? Our flesh is not bad. From the beginning, in Genesis, we encounter the truth that we are created when God’s Spirit is breathed into matter; we are a unity of spirit and flesh, breath and body.
So what are we to do with Paul, who seems to be criticizing the flesh in his letter to the Corinthians today? As I pray and wrestle with Paul on the one hand, and pray with Jesus, healing Simon Peter’s mother-in-law, on the other, I notice that Jesus cares about the flesh. Jesus heals her body. The body is not the enemy. Her body is a gift and she is healed.
What does she do when she is healed? Matthew tells us that she “waits on them.” The verb in the Greek is diakonei, most often translated as "serves" or "ministers." Her response to being healed, to the healing of flesh and spirit, is for her to unite her spirit and flesh in ministry and service.
The flesh is not bad. The spirit is not higher. As human beings we are a unity of spirit and flesh. As Christians we believe in the bodily resurrection, when flesh and spirit are healed forever and are forever a perfect unity. When our spirit is united with the Holy Spirit and our spirit and flesh live in perfect harmony, as God created us to be, it is then that we live fully in Christ.
Paul’s criticism today is about not letting God’s Spirit animate our spirit in unity with our flesh. Paul is calling us to care for one another in flesh, to unite spirit and flesh. This is what Peter’s mother-in-law so beautifully illustrates - her response to Christ’s healing is to unite the Spirit of God alive in her spirit with her flesh in service and ministry to those around her.
—Kelly Adamson