35 — The Promise to the Apostles.
The Promise to the Apostles.
Read St. Matt, xxviii. 19, 20.
[19] Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. [20] Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.
1. When Our Lord sent out His apostles to convert the world, their hearts might well quail at the difficulties of the task. They, poor, ignorant, unlearned men, how would they hope to achieve a work so apparently impossible? So their Master makes them a promise, which is one to fill their hearts with confidence and with sure expectation of success. He promises that He will always be with them; that whatever they undertake in His Name shall have His Omnipotence to supply for all their weakness. “I am with you always.” To us, Christ says just the same. In all that you do for Me I am always with you. What confidence this ought to give us!
2. These words meant more than this: they conferred upon the Church that He founded the promise that He would guide it to all truth; that He, through the Holy Spirit, would always be present to it, to preserve it from the least jot or tittle of error. Other religions wander off into every kind of error, and inconsistency, and contradictions; but the Church founded on the apostles has the Divine Teacher always present to it. How happy we should be to live under its roof, and to have it for our guide and teacher!
3. This promise is made to all the successors of the apostles, to the consummation of the world; popes, and bishops, and priests, each in their own degree, speak with the authority of Christ. “He that hears you, hears Me.” How reverently, then, we ought to listen to their words when they teach us truth!
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This article, 35 — The Promise to the Apostles. is a post from The Bellarmine Forum.
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