Bible Reading: Romans 11:16-22

Now if the first handful of the dough is holy, so also is the lump of dough; and if the root is holy, so also are the branches. But if some of the branches have been broken off, and if thou, being a wild olive, art grafted in their place, and hast become a partaker of the strem and fatness of the olive tree, do not boast against the branches. But if thou dost boast, still is is not thou that supportest the stem, but the stem thee.

Thou wilt say, then, "Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in." True, but they were broken off because of unbelief, whereas though by belief standest. Be not high minded, but fear. For if God has not spared the natural branches, perhaps he might not spare thee either. See, then, the goodness and the severity of God: his severity towards those who have fallen, but the goodness of God towards thee if thou abidest in his goodness; otherwise thou also wilt be cut off.

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Every time I reread something written by St. Paul, I marvel at his great understanding of God and his ways. Here he gives an analogy that is of great importance. He starts with a small analogy to explain that if a part of bread dough is considered holy, then since it came from the main body of bread dough, that all of the bread dough must logically be understood to be holy.

He then proceeds into the main analogy which is that all the faithful believers in God are like branches on a holy tree. The roots of the tree is from God, and therefore all the branches that are on the tree are holy, since they draw upon the holy source, being God, and they are branches on the tree due to their faith. But St. Paul explains that if a person loses faith they are like branches that separate and fall from the tree. Those new to the faith (those who hear and have a conversion of heart) are like a wild olive branch that is now grafted onto this holy olive tree of God. He points out that while obviously this is a good thing, the newcomers should not be boastful out of proportion to the faithful branches that already exist on the tree, and certainly not delight in those who have fallen away. St. Paul explains in this analogy that it is not a cause to rejoice when a branch breaks and falls away through unfaith, but it is also God's severity that those who lose their faith will at some point be allowed to fall away, unsaved. Those who find their faith will be welcomed to graft to the tree in the place of those who are unfaithful, and that is the goodness of God, because he welcomes the wild olive branch to graft to the holy olive tree of God. St. Paul had a number of purposes in writing this section and using this analogy, but the one I am focusing on (rather than the subject of conversions or finding of faith) is that those who find the tree and graft onto it must remember that they are giving God his due; they are not some special breed of faithful who has gotten some great "enlightenment" in superiority to either those who fell away or those that remain as branches in fullness with God.

Human nature huh? St. Paul knew humans very well.

If you think about it, remember that St. Paul was the conversion story of the ages. In his own time his story would have been phenomenal. He would not be unaware of that and here he is using an analogy that he obviously knows by heart through personal experience. He correctly implies his own exemplary role model where he joined as the wild olive branch grafting to the tree of God, but hardly will lord it over the branches already there, just because he had a spectacular conversion at having viewed the resurrected Christ on the road to Damascus. So St. Paul is revealing his conscious awareness of this ego danger that all humans share.

This should also give a clue to those who obsess about the "thorn" that St. Paul alludes to having. People like to read into the thorn all sorts of infirmities, and even try to apply sins or lusts to him that he must "control." Oh, that annoys me so much. It is obvious that the thorn St. Paul always had to deal with was his original pride and zealotry that had made him more than an extremely observant Jew, but an active persecutor and martyrer of Christians before his conversion.

If you could "read his mind," you would see that St. Paul views himself as having grafted himself onto the holy tree of God in a painful way, having grafted onto a thorn of his own pre-conversion persecution of Christians. That is the thorn that keeps him uneasy; St. Paul was always mindful that he came to God and the Lord Jesus Christ only because he had persecuted Christians so severely. St. Paul never let himself forget that for a moment, and thus he never had pride in his spectacular conversion and personal encounter with the resurrected Jesus Christ. St. Paul always viewed himself as having grafted onto the holy tree of God because he took the place of a thorn that was of his own making through the pre-conversion persecutions.

Here's another thought that St. Paul was fully aware of regarding the incredibly humbling nature of his conversion, rather than a source of pride. St. Paul had his encounter with the resurrected Christ and his calling to conversion precisely because he was such a severe persecutor. Christ asked him why he was persecuting him. Thus, if St. Paul were just an average observant Jew living a normal life, he would not have had that spectacular calling by Christ himself, and would have been just an average Jew who may or may not have heard the traveling evangelizers of Christ, and who may or may not have become a Christian as a result. But having been such a thorn and scourge of Christians, St. Paul received the spectacular encounter with the resurrected Jesus Christ who basically says to him, "Enough is enough!" Thus St. Paul pondered throughout his life as an Apostle of how he grafted to the tree of God, but first as a thorn to the tree. No "Jewish mother" could have put a bigger guilt trip on him than he did to himself throughout his life as an Apostle. This was the thorn that he constantly bore, and he certainly felt worse about it than Jesus would have wanted him to feel. So this remarkable analogy gives the Bible reader incredible insight into St. Paul's mind and heart. Analogies are often very autobiographical. Thus analogies help one to see the world through the eyes of the person creating and sharing the analogy. Interpretation of the thorn comment by St. Paul therefore becomes remarkably easy and clear to understand using the analogy that the saint himself provides overall.

He was a remarkable man. There never was one like him, nor will there be, because he was certainly one of a kind!